


Handsome

by deirdre_c



Category: CW Network RPF, Supernatural RPF
Genre: Beauty and the Beast Elements, Dragon!Jared, Except Jared likes books and tea, Fairy Tale Retellings, M/M, guardsman!Jensen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-29 02:38:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 37,266
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7667068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deirdre_c/pseuds/deirdre_c
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jensen is a royal guardsman who’s gravely wounded during the assassination of the Queen by her traitorous sister. He flees into the woods, where he stumbles across a mysterious, derelict castle. Jensen’s worst fears come to life when he discovers the castle is home to a terrifying dragon straight out of legend. Can Jensen recover from his wounds, vanquish the villains, save his father and the kingdom, and—on top of all that—fall in love with the dragon?</p><p>Of course he can. It’s a tale as old as time.</p><p>An homage to Disney's <i>Beauty and the Beast</i>, with some twists.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Handsome

***

Jensen forges up the path, straining just to stay in the saddle with each labored step his mount takes. Both of them are heaving for breath in the thinning air. Until now he’d been able to keep upright as the trail steepened, but he wonders how much longer he can endure. The pain in his side is worsening. There’s a ball of lead lodged there, tendrils of red heat snaking out from it, throbbing in time with his pulse.

The horse is finding its own way now, up the narrowing, near-imperceptible track. Small branches sting his face as they push past, but he barely notices them. 

He must’ve outpaced any pursuit by now. It’s been hours, this flight. Somehow he’d made it out of the City’s walls and through the crowded lanes of the nearest villages huddled up around them without being stopped, without being caught.

> _Jensen had gotten the Heir out of the Council Chamber safely, by some miracle, out of the Palace and sprinting headlong into the narrow warren of streets knitted haphazardly around it. Just him and the Heir and two other low-ranking guards. He wasn’t sure how much of a lead they had over the traitorous soldiers who had slain a room full of royals and courtiers minutes before. Jensen pushed the thought of the dead from his mind. He focused on running, on breathing through the pain, on keeping Prince Brock right behind him. Random turns to the left and right and left, until… “It’s a dead end.” Before them, a solid wall blocked where another alley should have opened up. Jensen leaned a shoulder against the brick for support and gasped to the Heir, “Up. Up to the rooftops, Sire.” To the men, “Go with him. To the South Barracks. Deliver him to General Morgan. To Morgan alone. I’ll lead them off in the opposite direction.”_  
> 

Jensen had made certain not to outpace the men following him until they were well to the north of the kingdom’s capital, Grandcoup, on their wild goose chase. He isn’t certain whether the Heir made it to safety, but he’s trying to buy Brock as much time as possible. Jensen had instinctively turned his stolen mount toward his own outlying hamlet, to his childhood home, like an injured animal seeking a familiar lair. But it hadn’t been long as he rode before it’d penetrated the red haze blanketing his mind that Richardson was the first place the traitor’s troops would look for him. Of course they would seek him out at home. Jensen could almost hear his father’s voice berating him for being stupid enough to almost lead them there.

The thought of his father simply added to his misery. If Jensen were half as skilled an armsman as his father once had been, he’d have found some way to avert disaster, to keep them all safe, to save the Queen. 

Instead Jensen found himself on the run, halfway up the mountain, hoping at last to shake the enemies still dogging his heels. 

_Enemies,_ he thinks, too numb with fatigue and pain to make sense of the word. Just yesterday, he’d called them his compatriots in the kingdom of LeGeai’s army.

> _The ornate doors to the Council Room burst open with no warning. Muskets aimed and fired, barking out death before anyone in the room could react. Jensen saw Queen Amanda as she leapt to her feet and took three shots to the chest, her body jerking with each impact, her last expression shock mirroring Jensen’s own as they saw her sister, Alaina, stalking into the room through the smoke shouting orders to her troops, who refilled their guns with powder and shot. Jensen grabbed Brock by the shoulder and shoved him toward the back corner, praying Alaina hadn’t known to station more killers at the door that opened onto a secret stair, made just for such escape. Behind them another volley flew. Jensen had no time to draw his own pistols. From the corner of his eye he saw Prince Colin sheltering behind one of the thick oaken chairs, pinned beneath the body of a fallen guard. Jensen shielded Brock with his body, too. A shot grazed his arm, another struck his side, blunt like a punch. No stopping. They hurtled through the concealed door and away. His last glimpse of the slaughter was the Queen’s sightless eyes staring at the ceiling. ___  
> 

Right now Jensen’s fairly certain he’s dying, too. Every step his horse takes has become excruciating. He presses his hand into his ribs, feels the expanding puddle of blood that’s soaked through the tattered panel of his jacket and the waistcoat beneath. It stains the lace on the sleeves of his formal court attire bright red. He wipes his sticky palm on his thigh.

Perhaps he should have gone to his father after all. To say goodbye.

His vision blurs, but he doesn’t dare stop. Winter has just recently retreated, and this spring’s been cold and damp. The chill is even worse on the mountainside than in the valley. The thready light of the afternoon has turned to grey and in a few hours it will be gone. He’ll never survive a night without shelter. 

If he survives at all.

The forest seems to be thinning ahead, the path starting to widen. He presses his knee into the stalwart mare’s side, encouraging it up one more rise. His eyes search for a shelf of rock that might indicate a cave, a hollow, someplace he can go to ground.

Instead, as he emerges from a break in the trees, he discovers before him—rising out of the rock as if grown from the mountain’s stone itself—a massive castle.

Great, gray planes of masoned stone jut up from the ground. The weight of the thick walls contrasts with a cluster of slender, cylindrical towers, broad banks of diamond-cut windows juxtapose with arrow slits. The rooflines are worn and cracked in places, individual bricks softened and crumbling from the ravages of time. Twisted ivy and layers of moss blanket the walls in green, all the way up to the ramparts, and a thicket of what must be hundreds of wild rose bushes—their nascent, tightly-furled buds snippets of color among the briars—encircle the outer walls and encroach into the empty grounds, stretching out toward the forest fringe.

Jensen realizes that he’s come to a halt, stunned by the inexplicable sight of a castle where no castle should be. He clucks softly to his horse, urging it cautiously onto the footbridge that spans a shallow moat. They pass underneath wrought-iron gates three times the height of a man. The gates stand ajar, and Jensen can only hope that the place is abandoned. It must be. 

Everything is still. The ring of his horse’s hooves on the paving stones echoes bleakly. His wound throbs in time.

Once inside, Jensen finds the grounds themselves are even stranger. Although signs of ruin and disrepair are everywhere—even clearer up close— just to the left he spies an elaborate garden, carefully tended. There are terraces of artfully arrayed plants and grasses, low shrubs, walkways carefully lined with crushed pebbles and shallow stone benches. He sees two intricate topiaries flanking the entrance to what looks like a formal hedge maze, the greenery neatly trimmed and squared away.

Jensen barely has time to wonder at the beauty of the garden in such forsaken wilds, when the main doors to the inner hall swing open, and a man steps out into the failing light. 

There’s something familiar about the figure. Steel gray hair and bushy brows, a pointed chin, the stiff posture of a soldier.

Jensen blinks. Could it be? He must be delirious. He watches the man turn as if to speak to someone following behind, and in that instant, there is no doubt who it is. 

_Father._ Jensen’s head spins, not just from blood loss. 

Yet his surprise at discovering his father in this place is but a featherweight against shock and dread he feels a moment later. When he sees what emerges from the castle next. 

It’s a dragon. 

No. It simply can’t be possible. Dragons are only legend, wild stories spun by children and fools and crackpots. A fabulous tale to tell in low voices around a campfire, or concocted by a roaming tinker come to town looking to draw a crowd for his cheap wares. 

As a child, Jensen had hated these stories. Hated the accounts of dragons stalking through the night, burning whole villages, stealing away children for their monstrous appetites, merciless and bloodthirsty, foes to all humans. The winged beasts haunted Jensen’s nightmares, even as his father hung on every word, cherishing every new detail of dragonkind. 

As an adult, Jensen had watched as his father’s fame and respect as a royal armsman became eclipsed by this obsession, people whispering behind their hands, tutting condescendingly at a grown man’s credulity, his fixation on the myth of dragons. Mad, some called him.

But by all that’s holy, it is truly a dragon here before him.

It’s not a huge beast, but as it ducks its head to clear the archway and stand looming over Jensen’s father, it seems enormous. In that awful first moment, Jensen takes in its diamond-shaped head sitting atop a thin, sinuous neck, its razor sharp fangs and killer claws. He can see its wings—massive, graceful arcs of bone and translucent skin—not quite laying flat against its back. It stands out against the gray stone of the castle’s walls, its deep green hide as smooth and lustrous as a the leaves of summer trees in shadow, or like emerald jewels illuminated by candlelight. _Or like the slime at the bottom of a well_ , Jensen adds, refusing to allow himself to admire anything about such a loathsome creature. 

The dragon turns, rising up slightly on its hind legs, as if it’s about to lash out. It moves into a patch of sunlight, and Jensen can see that the green tones shade into glints of copper and amber, gold and turquoise along its soft underbelly. 

That’s where Jensen must aim. Quickly now. 

He rowels the side of his poor horse and gasps as he reaches across his body to his saddlebow. The brace of small, pearl-handled flintlock pistols he wears as part of his court uniform may be decorative, but they are functional enough for this. 

He draws one out of its holster. He can barely stay seated, nearly drops the weapon from his grasp, weaker than a babe despite the adrenaline flooding him with renewed energy. His arm shakes as he raises it, the lumbering gait of the tired horse jostling him further, and he knows he must get at least some dozen yards more before he can possibly hope to hit his target. 

He should be afraid, knowing better than most people the tales of how impervious dragons are to attack, the damage and death they can wreak in return. But he feels no fear, just burning anger. He’s done for anyway. Why not try to save his father, and perhaps to seek some personal vengeance on the embodiment of his father’s mania?

The monster spots him and rears back further, nearly hitting its head on the ceiling of the doors’ ornamented overhang. 

“Alan! Beware, there’s an intruder!” it says, in words as plain as day. Its voice has a rich, mellow timber, like one of those stringed instruments you have to hold between your knees to play. It’s not the savage growl that Jensen would expect. If he’d ever given much thought to what a talking dragon would sound like.

Jensen shakes his head. This is no time for hallucinations. 

“Father, run!” he yells, his voice hardly strong enough to carry across the open space. He’s almost close enough to pull the trigger—impossible as it is to imagine he can actually do the creature harm—when his father dashes forward. He places himself directly in Jensen’s line of fire, his hands held out, commanding. 

“My god, Jensen. Stop!” 

Jensen may or may not have obeyed, if from nothing else but habit—obedient son, obedient soldier. But it doesn’t matter, because his horse reacts before he can. It plants its forefeet and halts, so abruptly that it skews back almost on its haunches. Jensen is flung forward out of the saddle, the sky and the grass smearing circles into one another as he tumbles, plummets, and hits the ground with a sickening _thud_. 

Darkness and pain shoot through him, almost too much to bear. Jensen forces them back once more. He can’t pass out now, not with his father rushing toward him, the beast closing in behind. 

He tries to roll onto his side to see more clearly, but suddenly his father’s arms are around him. They pull and clutch him close, and Jensen can’t hold back a moan as a fresh wave of agony surges over him. He can’t tell whether it’s the earlier musket shot, or, more likely, that he broke a rib or two in the fall.

“Jensen,” he hears his father say, but it’s as if from a long way away. “My boy, what has befallen?” It’s been years since his father spoke to him so kindly, and in his weakness, it makes Jensen’s throat tight with unshed tears. There’s no time to weep, though.

“Get away, sir, save yourself,” he gasps, struggling to move, to get in front of his father and try to shield him from the beast’s imminent attack, futile as that may be. It could use fire, or vile sorcery, or it might simply disembowel them with swipe of its talons.

Yet his father’s hands are firm, holding Jensen immobile. “There is no danger, I swear.”

“But the—“ Jensen has trouble saying the word aloud, even as the thing slithers up to stand beside them. “—the dragon?” 

“Harmless,” his father insists. “But how have you come here? How were you hurt?”

Jensen has a hundred more questions, but a sudden image of the slaughter at the royal castle flashes through his muddled brain, and he has to tell, to warn, to hand off this burden. His father will know what to do next. “There was a plot against the Queen. Alaina and her adherents have murdered her, likely Prince Colin as well—” Jensen swallows hard against that thought, “—a dozen others who sat with us as they met in Council. Her troops are in the Palace, in the City. They—they hunted us, sir, but I think the Heir may have escaped.” Jensen has to halt as another bolt of pain jags through him. He squeezes his eyes shut and finds he can barely reopen them to slits. “Father,” he murmurs again. All others words seem to have been emptied out in that final delivery.

“The Queen. Murdered.” There’s quiet agony in his father’s voice. How many years had he spent as one of a handful of her closest guardians, when she herself was a young girl and newly crowned?

“Jared,” his father says then, urgently. And it takes Jensen a moment to realize he’s talking to the dragon. How odd. “Can you help him?”

From above them comes another voice. “Perhaps. I don’t know.” It’s the monster. “It depends on how much internal damage there is, how weak he’s become. From the look of his coat, it appears he’s been shot. Is it musket ball? I’m afraid I’m don’t have much expertise when it comes to weapons.” It’s insane, but the dragon sounds almost… apologetic. Concerned, even.

“We can’t just sit here. Jensen is near death, my Queen is killed, and the realm is likely in chaos!”

“Well, there’s nothing you can do for your son, I’m afraid,” the dragon replies. “Unless you know more of the healers’ art than you’ve let on, which hasn’t actually come up in conversation before now, it’s true, however that’s not surprising, given that neither of us has been ill, but—“ The beast looks down at Jensen, and the sudden intensity of its gaze makes him feel like his very soul is being weighed and measured. Its words become less wandering, more clipped, serious. “I’ll keep him here. I will do all I can to keep him alive. You go back down the mountain. Find out what’s happened to your people.”

Of course that’s right. There’s no reason for his father to stay, just to watch Jensen breathe his last. Especially not when he could be of aid to others. It wouldn’t be like his father at all.

Jensen uses the last of his strength to raise his head, catching his father’s gaze with his own. “Go,” he urges. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees the dragon lean closer, and Jensen shudders. 

There is part of him—the part that’s still a small boy—which wants to beg his father not to leave. Not to abandon him in the dragon’s odious clutches. But Colonel Ackles’ commitment has always been to the Crown, even after retirement compelled him into his strange role as dragon scholar and local curiosity. Even if he’s only one man, Jensen knows nothing will stop his father from going to the Queen’s Palace in Grandcoup, if there’s any chance to help defend what’s left of the royal family. Jensen respects that duty. His father had instilled that same fundamental loyalty into Jensen from the earliest age. It’s why Jensen joined the service as soon as he was old enough. Oh, how he longs to stand up and ride away now, too.

 _And not just because the Prince still needs me_ , he thinks, closing his eyes against the unnerving sight of the dragon, looming over them. 

“I’m sorry, Jensen,” his father murmurs. His hands grip Jensen’s shoulders hard, and then he eases him off his lap to stand. The cold ground beneath Jensen feels so good, and he recognizes that fever has set upon him. “Jared will take care of you,” his father continues firmly. “He’ll heal you. And I’ll return when—if—I can.” 

Jensen must be losing the last of his senses. What can a beast do to help? And why would it wish to help Jensen anyway? It’s more likely to kill him. Or eat him. Or both. Either way, it probably can’t hurt worse than this.

He tries to watch as his father turns and hurries away, grabbing the reins of Jensen’s mount and leading it towards a set of stables that are tucked into one corner of the courtyard. But Jensen doesn’t even have the strength to turn his head.

“Sleep,” he hears the dragon whisper. And he does.

 

***

 

Jensen’s delirious. He’s dreaming. He’s had dreams like this before, dreams of a beautiful man, gently stripping off his clothes as he lies helpless. A beautiful man with broad shoulders and skin like honey. Eyes like oceans. Hands like heaven.

He waits. Waits for those hands to move lower, to touch more intimately. This is about the time—if past dreams are any gauge to measure by—there will be a tight grip around his cock, a loose tugging at his sac, the wet heat of lips and tongue and the slick, tender curve at the back of the man’s throat.

But no. There’s none of these. Only what feels like cool water dribbling over a burn, then measured pressure against his wound, prodding and tugging. No pain—shouldn’t there be pain?—but Jensen can’t see, doesn’t understand. Tries to blink to clear his vision, to no avail. A bitter-herb tasting drink dribbles past his lips. He struggles, tries to spit it out, to choke. But firm hands hold him still. There are nonsensical words. And _hush, hush._

Then he is alone.

He dreams of his mother, soothing him through another fever, a toddler’s fever. The same fever that took her life. He dreams of his father, teaching him the rudiments of combat with a small wooden sword, watching him jump his pony over a hedgerow, reading to him before bed by candlelight. A book full of vivid pictures of great winged fiends, of dragons unleashing havoc in ancient, faraway lands, of fire disgorged in orange and crimson on the page.

 

***

 

Jensen wakes. Or no. He must still be dreaming. Because the man is there again, silhouetted against the flames in the hearth across the room. He’s tall, his back a solid wall. He’s looking down and Jensen can’t see his face. There’s long hair falling forward, obscuring it.

The stranger turns and approaches the bed and once again Jensen’s thoughts turn to desire. It’s a face to write sonnets for, sharp features and sculpted cheekbones stained with pink from the heat of the fire. His chestnut hair sweeps back from a high forehead to fall, unruly, along his jaw. His mouth is wide and made for kissing. If only in this dream Jensen weren’t so feeble, so very _cold_. He shudders as the man pulls back the blanket and sits on the edge of the bed. 

Somehow, there’s a basin. And a cloth. Cool water across his brow, the pungent scents of rue and rosemary. The beautiful man, workmanlike, impersonal, wiping him down like a hard-used horse. 

“Well, this is peculiar. Strange, no question,” the man mutters softly to himself as he strokes the cloth down Jensen’s bare chest, his shoulders, his belly. “You. You’re strange, but—“ the words are barely a sigh but Jensen catches them. “—special.” 

Strong arms ease Jensen up to a sitting position to bathe his back, and he finds himself tucked into the crook of the man’s neck. Unable to resist, he turns his head to mouth at the skin there, letting his tongue slide along the taut tendon. Jensen can’t ever remember clearly tasting something in a dream before, but a heady mix of salty sweat and masculinity fills his senses. 

The stranger goes rigid, his breath hitching sharply at Jensen’s touch. He doesn’t push Jensen away, but he doesn’t respond, either. Jensen’s sick-addled brain protests again that this is not how the fantasy is supposed to proceed. He tries to raise his chin to look at the man’s expression, but his head feels heavier than a pile of stones. Jensen closes his eyes instead, nuzzles deeper into that muscular shoulder. He fumbles weakly for his dream lover’s hand, tries to pull it into his lap, willing his cock to thicken and throb. Willing himself to burn and shiver with something other than fever. Willing himself not to die. 

The man recoils, practically falling off the bed, and to Jensen’s shame he hears himself let out a soft cry, both at the pain from the sudden jostle and the disappointment at the loss of the sweet sensation of heat and strength. 

The man does not speak again. He does not return. Or if he does, Jensen’s unaware.

 

***

 

He rushes up once again from the well of darkness, and this time Jensen’s certain he’s not dreaming, because his eyes are crusted over and stinging and his body aches as if he’d been trampled by a herd of cattle. 

Someone has bandaged his side while he’s slept; he can feel the tautness of the linen as he breathes. His side still throbs insistently, but the pain is no longer fierce, overwhelming, mortal. 

He find that he’s lying in a grand, old-fashioned bed, one of those with carven posts and embroidered curtains that Jensen has only seen members of the nobility possess. The room beyond appears to be grand as well or, at least, it was once a long time ago. Plaster from the high ceilings has cracked, dropping into crumbled piles on the floor, and in random places the velvet-napped, gilt wallpaper has peeled off of the walls in long strips of crimson and gold. The room is cluttered with peculiar, expensive furniture: a chaise and two stately armoires, spindly side tables and satin ottomans and grandiose curio cabinets full of objets d’art. Across the room there’s a dining table large enough for twelve, but with only three mismatched chairs, its surface stacked with books and papers. Beyond that are a set of large, arched double doors, propped open so that Jensen can see they exit into a Great Room beyond.

And over by the enormous formal fireplace is the dragon, curled up, its wings smoothed flat and its tail tucked under itself. It looks smaller. Less intimidating. It is also reading a book, which is one of the least intimidating things Jensen can imagine. He should be scrambling away in fear and revulsion, but instead he finds he’s mostly…curious. He watches the beast reach out with one claw and delicately turn the thick page of a leather-bound tome at least a yard wide.

“Nice to see you awake.” It doesn’t turn its head, doesn’t glance in his direction. “I’m glad you’re feeling better. That is, if you are. You haven’t said anything yet, so perhaps you aren’t, which wouldn’t be at all surprising, what with losing so much blood and cracking a rib and all. Luckily, the ball wasn’t lodged very deep… although perhaps you’d prefer that I didn’t describe all of the gory details.”

It cuts off this torrent of words abruptly and ducks its head down below the top edge of the book as if hiding. As if it’s embarrassed.

Jensen’s never imagined speaking with a dragon before. If he’d even believed dragons existed or could speak. And if he had, he would have told you that he’d sooner cut its head off than exchange a civil word. But here he is, not dead as he should be, lying in a soft bed, the wound in his side no longer trying to devour him from the inside out. 

Not that any of that matters. It doesn’t seem like a time for either conversation or slaughter.

“I have to go,” Jensen croaks, his throat dry. He tries to sit up, and quickly finds that he’s nowhere near as fit as he’d hoped. His head spins and his whole body screams in protest. He flops perforce back onto the mattress like a landed fish and realizes he’s naked but for the bandage around his middle and scrambles to pull the bedsheets back up to cover himself. What the hell? Where are his clothes? 

“I think that you should try to stay still, at least for a bit longer,” the dragon says mildly. “You aren’t recovered yet, and it’s taken awhile just to get you to this point. It would be a shame if you made it this far, only to relapse because of doing too much, too soon.”

“How long?” Jensen demands sharply, all other questions swept aside as he recalls the recent terrible events. Recalls the Queen, the princes, his father. “How long have I been unconscious?”

“This is the third day.” Jensen sees one large eye peek back over the top of the pages. Jensen notices that it’s almond-shaped and slightly tip-tilted. The pupil is round like a human’s, with the iris a kaleidoscope of blue-green. “But your fever finally broke during the night, and, according to what I’ve read, it’s simply a matter now of healing and getting your strength back.” Its head disappears again and disembodied words float across the room. “Unless infection sets in.”

Jensen has seen soldiers with blood infections that go systemic. It’s neither an easy nor quick way to die. “Do you know how to cure that?”

“I think so. But I’m not finished reading.” It sits up even higher and bobs its head toward the book. “Really there’s so much about human physiology I never knew, it’s all very interesting, particularly the immune system, which—”

“How long?” Jensen says again, realizing the dragon will babble on unless he interrupts. “How long before I can leave?”

“I don’t know,” the dragon replies, slightly chastened, almost anxious at his lack of knowledge. It’s strange how Jensen can read the emotions of the beast so easily. Even if he weren’t addled from fever and pain, the whole scene would still seem surreal.

“Anything could be happening,” Jensen mutters, half to himself. “The Heir could be captive, or killed, my father could’ve walked into a trap.”

“There’s not much you can do about it, I’m afraid,” the dragon chimes in, returning to what appears to be its bizarrely cheery manner. “Even if you could get to Grandcoup—which you can’t—you couldn’t be much help to them in your state. Although, I suppose it depends on what you’re needed for. Maybe you could be useful in developing battle tactics? I don’t suppose you could shout orders to troops while propped up in bed?”

“You’re not helping.” Jensen rubs a hand over his face, trying to brush away the cobwebs of illness, trying to make some kind sense out of this demented situation. 

“Oh. Of course. Sorry.” The dragon subsides for a moment behind its book, but then pops back up again. “Would you like dinner?”

“I’m not hungry,” Jensen snaps. The dragon winces, and Jensen almost feels contrite. But to hell with worrying about etiquette when dealing with a fucking _dragon_.

“Maybe later. Would you like some water at least?” It points a claw toward the nightstand next to the bed, the glass on it half-full. 

Jensen’s thirst returns. He reaches out for the glass but realizes he has to sit up to drink. Gingerly, he moves, attempting to put as little pressure on his side as he can. He struggles with the bedding, grunts at what feels like stitches pulling ominously. 

In the blink of an eye, the dragon is moving across the room toward him. It’s as silent and fluid as quicksilver, one moment by the fire, the next right beside the bed, incredibly large, reaching out one arm as if would help Jensen up. Like it’s going to touch him. 

Jensen jerks back in horror. A bolt of pain shoots across his ribs. “No!”

“Excuse me!” the dragon cries, drawing back hastily in turn. “I did not mean to startle—I was—was just going to help. Never mind.”

It edges backward, retreating toward the giant book, its head low to the ground, non-threatening. Almost like a hound, if a hound were twice the size of a horse. 

Jensen again feels the absurd temptation to apologize. But he finds suddenly he doesn’t have the strength for even a single word. It’s as if the slot of a lantern has been shut and the oxygen feeding the flame disappears. Jensen’s light flickers and dims. He drinks, fumbles and almost spills the water setting the glass back down. His head drops to the pillow with a soft thud.

His skin crawls at the thought of the thing sitting there, just watching him as he sleeps. But underneath that aversion is a small thread of calm, a strange feeling that nothing bad will happen as long as the dragon is safeguarding him.

 _Jared,_ Jensen recalls as he’s swiftly drawn into darkness again. _Father called it ‘Jared.’_

 

***

 

He doesn’t sleep as long this time, as far as he can tell. The angle of the sun coming through the windows has only shifted slightly in the interim. 

“I found something that I believe is going to help. Both with the pain and with the knitting of your wound.”

Jensen jolts in surprise at the sound, his heart suddenly racing. Never, never will he be used to the idea of being in the room with a dragon, much less one that likes to chat.

“The recipe was unclear in some places about the correct proportions, but I think I estimated everything correctly.” The beast is by the hearth again, but this time it’s stirring something in a pan over the neatly-lain fire, a long-handled spoon clutched in its large, but somehow elegant claws. Something about the sight, the way it’s standing, seems to ring a bell in the corner of Jensen’s brain. Then the dragon transfers the contents of the pan into a teapot and carries it carefully to Jensen’s bedside, and the moment is gone.

Up close, the thing’s teeth are quite terrifying. But Jensen finds himself looking at all the ways this real dragon is different from how the legends describe them. How its hide appears so soft, not encased in armored scales. How lanky it is, not bulging with muscle and fearsome power. How its eyes are fringed with long lashes, the expression in them so concerned. 

With more dexterity than such a large creature should possibly possess, the dragon deftly pours the tea, or whatever it is, into a delicate porcelain cup with a gold-plated rim and handle. “This tea set was here when I discovered this place. I did some research and it may be an antique from the Lansbury Era over 250 years old. Isn’t that amazing?”

Jensen picks up the cup and looks into it skeptically. He brings it up to his nose for a sniff. The liquid has a verdant smell—tangy, like cut grass or fresh reeds by a riverbank—and something else, unrecognizable, sweet and acrid at the same time. 

“You can drink it,” the dragon assures him. “It’s safe.”

“Is it magic?” Jensen says the word like it burns his tongue. Humans have no magic. In the oldest histories of their realm and all the lands around it, their laws forbid citizens anything to do with it, and as such, if it had once existed among them at all, it had petered out long ago. This lack made the folktales of dragons’ dark and powerful sorcery even more frightful. His father’s avid interest in its existence had felt dangerous and had made Jensen uneasy. Jensen’s always been a man dedicated to rule of law. Jensen’s always been a man who rejected the fantastical.

And yet. 

He peers into the cup again. 

What would magic look like?

“There’s no magic in there,” Jared answers. “Unless you consider the propitious combination of medicinal herbs to be magical. Sometimes I think some of the plants in my garden appear as if by magic, because I certainly do _not_ remember seeding them. This spring I’ve been battling both ragwort and hawksbeard, which are completely useless and aren’t even pretty as ornamentals.”

“But dragons _are_ sorcerers? You can do magic?” Jensen presses.

The dragon snorts and Jensen looks up quickly to see if it’s breathing fire. Is it true they can breathe fire? But there’s only a self-deprecating smile on its face. “Not much. I have some little magic. Child’s magic. Parlor tricks and—um—“ The dragon glances aside for a moment but then continues. “One or two other things that every dragon youngster learns. You see, magic is temporary, illusory. I’m more interested in knowledge. Knowledge is ever-lasting.” 

It makes the pronouncement primly, sounding more like a schoolmarm than a monster. Jensen has to remind himself that, no matter how charming this particular creature may seem, dragonkind has the weight of all his people’s lore and all his father’s meticulous research against them, telling Jensen that they are alien and deadly. 

A small voice inside whispers, _That’s the same father who left you in this one’s care._

Jensen takes a sip from the teacup, rolling the strange tastes around in his mouth. The liquid tingles, warming his throat and chest like a swig of brandy. Almost immediately the strain in his muscles from bracing against each painful breath starts to loosen. He allows himself to lean back against the headboard. He’s feeling brave, foolhardy in fact. “Can you show me some?”

“Knowledge?” the dragon asks.

“Magic.”

The dragon cocks his head, eyes sparking bright blue and gold with eagerness. “Really? You’d like to see? I know not everyone—I mean, your father was always interested, but—yes. I could show you.”

It raises a front foreleg and waves it toward the tray of convalescent’s food that had been placed on the nightstand since the last time Jensen looked. There’s an array of fine dishes holding small portions of various tempting foods. They seem fine enough to be served at the Court’s High Table: soup, ragout, a cheese soufflé, some grey stuff that looks like pâté, a half-loaf of soft, white bread with butter. If Jensen felt even a fraction of his normal appetite, he would have devoured the lot with gusto. As it is—between his damn infirmity and his apprehension over what magic might entail—he simply grips the blankets in his fist like a lifeline and watches for what the dragon will do.

A moment later, the silverware skitters across the tray top and then floats up into midair, untouched. The spoon, fork, and knife pinwheel and dance to and fro across the bed in front of him, the plates levitate and spin slowly, careful not to spill their food. 

Jensen reaches out to touch one of the twirling utensils and his finger tip tingles, a sparkling sense rushing up his arm like frozen nerves beginning to thaw. “Oh,” he breathes. 

But then he glances at the tray and sees that the original silverware is still sitting beside the plate, all of them normal and still. He looks back to the dancing pieces just as they fade and wink out of sight in a cascade of twinkling light like shooting stars in the night sky.

The dragon is watching Jensen carefully. “What do you think? Are you disappointed? I’m afraid that it’s nothing special,” it says. “Like I said, just illusion.” 

Jensen composes his face, trying not to show the rush of delight he feels. It’s not right. Dragon spells are supposed to be malevolent things designed to deceive and injure humans. But this? This was charming. It was whimsical. And although Jensen’s never much cared for charming and whimsical before, he finds himself tempted to ask for more. He restrains himself, slowly taking another mouthful of tea. 

“I’m not disappointed,” he admits at last, torn between keeping his guard up and wanting to ease the anxious furrow on his host’s brow. Why does he care how the dragon feels? And why does he care if he reveals his own amazement?

The dragon gives a little sigh of relief and starts puttering around, pouring fresh tea into Jensen’s cup and straightening the bedding. Jensen’s suddenly aware of how easily he’s adjusted to its nearness. He could reach out and touch it if he wanted. 

Not that he wants to. 

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course. That is, you may, if you’re feeling up to it.”

Jensen lets out a surprised huff of amusement at the casual slight to his grammar. “Why are you like this? I mean—” he gestures vaguely at the tea, the food. “I thought dragons hated humans? Why are all the stories I’ve ever heard full of horror and destruction and the devouring of virgin sacrifices?”

The puttering stops, and the dragon turns to Jensen. “It’s not that we hate humans. Or, let’s put it this way, some dragons hate humans, but not _because_ they’re humans. You see, dragons by nature tend to be very… acquisitive. So some dragons, if they feel something of theirs is threatened, might attack, sometimes preemptively, to protect and keep what they think is in jeopardy.” The dragon shrugs, rustling its wings. “And some are just louts, honestly. The problem is, dragons also tend to be very solitary, and sort of grumpy. Most have never even seen a human, wouldn’t want to. So they hide. Humans never get the chance to encounter most dragons, so they only know the tales of the rare altercations with the cruel and violent ones.”

It makes Jensen contemplate just how one-sided every legend he’s heard might have been. “And I’m guessing there are a lot of humans out there who are ‘acquisitive’ as well. Guessing that when they go hunting for legendary dragon treasure, there’s likely to be a confrontation.”

“It wasn’t always that way,” it says. “There was a time—long, long ago—when dragons and humans lived in closer harmony. Not many of those stories have been passed down. Perhaps because they aren’t as exciting as the gory battles. In some of the histories I’ve been able to dig up, at least, it’s just assumed that there is regular association, trade and alliances, shared property. I mean, just look at this castle.”

The dragon points around the room. Jensen follows its gesture, but doesn’t get what he’s expected to see.

“It was deserted years ago,” it explains, “and I haven’t yet been able to determine who its owners were, but this was clearly built to accommodate dragons, in the days when men and my kind lived amicably.” The dragon darts over to the double doorway and extends its wings, its face animated with the telling. “All the entries are larger than necessary, the ceilings too. The stairs are shallow and wide, not very comfortable for human stride, but easier for dragons than regular human stairs.” 

“I’ve seen that style in many other chateaus, and in Queen Amanda’s palace as well,” Jensen says. “Perhaps it’s just an architectural fashion?”

“Yes, yes, I’ve seen descriptions of those, too. Although I don’t really understand why some humans have a preference for feeling tiny in their own homes. Or maybe a giant lived here before, not a human? I’ve never met a giant, but then you’ve never met a dragon, and _I’m_ real. Except why would a giant keep human-sized furniture? Never mind, it doesn’t matter, because there’s evidence of dragon accommodation in the layout of the kitchens, the stables. Some of the balconies have special reinforcements that enable me to take flight off of them without causing a collapse. I keep running into different aspects as I explore the place. It’s all very exciting.”

Jensen finds a smile playing around his lips, reluctantly beguiled by the dragon’s enthusiasm. “Just how long have you lived here?”

“Not such a long time. But dragons are quite long-lived by your standards, so you would probably account it as more than I do. Once you are up and around you’ll see I haven’t made much headway in cleaning up all of the neglected parts of the castle and the derelict rooms.”

“But the gardens?” Jensen says dryly, recalling the meticulously tended hedgerows.

“Ah, yes,” it replies with satisfaction. “The gardens are coming along nicely.” The creature practically scampers across the room to peek out of the window so it can look out at the landscaping. When it brushes against the thick brocade curtains that hang on either side, dust billows up. “It would be nice if the sun would come out a bit more, though. Too much rain is almost as bad as too little. Especially for the roses. Some of the varieties can be very temperamental, and the soil does not drain well in that low southeast corner of the property. ”

Jensen wonders how long the dragon would ramble on about the subject if uninterrupted. “You said dragons are loners. But you don’t seem very shy.”

It glances quickly over its shoulder and then ducks its head, turning to look back out the window. If a dragon could blush, that’s what this one would be doing. “It’s true. I’m odd that way. Have been all my life. And since there are few of my dragonkin around, or who are willing to put up with my gregarious ways, I tend to gravitate toward humans.” He looks sidelong at Jensen again. “That is, when I can find ones that are not superstitiously afraid.”

Jensen frowns. He thinks he’s been fairly undaunted under the circumstances. “Is that how my father came here? How did you meet?”

“Oh. Um. How did I meet Alan? I—uh, I often need supplies—there are so many things I can’t make or grow myself—and in order to trade for those I, well, I sometimes trade with humans. If I safely can. And your father—um, he came upon me when I was making one of those trades. But he is not a man who’s frightened by dragons—”

Jensen mutters under his breath, “You can say that again.”

“—and he was curious about me, so we talked. And it was nice to have a—a friend, I guess.”

Jensen tried to imagine the gruff, demanding man he knew his father to be in conversation with this loquacious creature. Considering it a ‘friend.’ Did his father even have friends? On the other hand, given his father’s dragon mania, Jensen’s fairly sure the man would have braved the den of one of those aggressive dragons, just for a chance to meet one. _Right before he got fried to a crisp,_ Jensen thought wryly.

It hits Jensen that he himself is sitting here conversing amiably with a dragon, when at one time, when he was a small boy, he’d imagined he would grow up to be a great hunter, travelling the world to track them down, shooting them right through the heart, ridding the world of the dragon scourge. Of course, that was before he was old enough to learn that dragons were a myth. 

And now, incredibly, all of Jensen’s original assumptions are crumbling in the face of a dragon that serves tea and worries about the roses.

[ ](http://s37.photobucket.com/user/deirdre_c/media/Handsome%20tea%20is%20served%20art_zpsa9znleqh.jpg.html)

 

***

 

“I can’t just sit here all day watching you read.” Jensen knows he sounds ungracious, but he’s never been a very good invalid. And this is by far the worst injury he’s ever sustained. He’d rested again for a little while, but only in a kind of twilight half-doze. He’s both exhausted and not sleepy, and he doesn’t have time for this. He broods over the strife happening in the valley below.

“If you want to heal faster,” the dragon replies distractedly, not even raising its head from the book it’s buried in, “drink faster.” 

The tea does seem to be fairly miraculous in its healing properties, from what Jensen could tell when he surreptitiously peeled back the bandage to inspect how bad the gunshot wound actually was. The raw edges were already mending, the gash only slightly weeping. There was no sign of ominous red streaks that signaled infection. Not as bad as he feared, but not good enough. 

Good god, the fever only broke this morning, and he’s already sick of this bed.

“You can’t keep me prisoner,” Jensen declares melodramatically, only half-joking. 

At that, his host raises its head. “You’re welcome to leave any time, of course.” A series of emotions crosses the dragon’s face at that, too quick for Jensen to read. But then it continues, teasing. “I predict you could make it at least as far as the main doors before fainting. Possibly even the gates if you really put forth an effort. If you didn’t manage to put a rib through one of your lungs.”

“My ribs are mending,” Jensen huffs. “It’s not like they’re floating around in there with sharp points at the ready.”

“No, you’re right. You’re coming along wonderfully since you’ve been awake. It’s just there were bad moments there—the fever was—well. That’s all behind you now. You’ll be ready to be on your way sooner than I’d have guessed.” The dragon ends its reassurance brightly, but the tone of it is just a little off. 

They fall into silence once more. Jensen stares up at the ceiling, tracing the cracks that radiate out from the ornamental medallion in the middle. 

“If you’re a dragon,” he wonders aloud, “where is your hoard?”

“My what?”

“Your secret treasure? A mountain of gold and diamonds? It’s common knowledge that all dragons have them. Didn’t you tell me that dragons were acquisitive by nature?”

The dragon grins. It should be fierce, those rows of glittering teeth. But instead it’s almost… sweet. There’s an actual dimple in the corner of one cheek. Jensen surprises himself by smiling back, and then automatically wipes it off his face. The world is in turmoil, this is no time to smile.

“We dragonkin are collectors, it’s true. And some are known for collecting pretty baubles. Tends to get some you in trouble and attract the wrong kind of attention as far as I’m concerned, but none of them ever listen. Me, though? I’m a scholar. My treasure’s a bit different than most.”

“And what’s that?”

“Hmmm. What if I show you?” The dragon looks him up and down. “I think you’re right. It’s about time you got up and around. They say that brief periods of walking actually speeds healing and is conductive to quicker recovery. Although I read that is the case for certain surgical incisions, but I have to believe it should apply to more violent wounds as well. Wait here.”

The dragon scampers abruptly out of the room, leaving Jensen staring at the empty doorway. 

“’Wait here,’” he grumbles to himself. “What else do you think I’m going to do?”

Just a few minutes later the dragon returns, carrying a huge wardrobe wrapped in its tail. As if the room wasn’t overflowing with enough odd furniture already. Jensen watches in bemusement as it sets the wardrobe down against the nearest wall with a _thunk_. 

“I tried to clean the clothes you arrived in,” the dragon huffs, sounding slightly out of breath. It indicates a chaise across the room. Jensen hadn’t noticed before, but on top sits his court uniform neatly folded, his tall, newly-shined boots lined up carefully on the floor beneath. “Unfortunately, the jacket and shirt and waistcoat were all ruined, and not all of the bloodstains came out of the trousers.”

Jensen shudders, forcing himself not to think about the beast stripping off the clothes from his unconscious body. Perhaps his father had stayed long enough to tend to him discreetly? But Jensen knows that’s not what happened.

His mind’s eye conjures up the gorgeous man from his fever dreams. If only _he_ had been more than a figment, Jensen would actually enjoy the thought of having been undressed unknowing.

The dragon’s voice breaks into his musing. “I’ve discovered that the castle’s previous residents left almost everything intact. Some of it is even still usable, if antiquated. We can see if there’s anything in here you might wear.” It opens the wardrobe doors and a couple of moths flutter out. “Oh! How unfortunate. Still—” the dragon sticks its head inside and fumbles around, “—here we are.” 

Out of the wardrobe’s depths comes an old-fashioned white muslin shirt, unfashionably full-sleeved with a slit at the neck that closes with a tie. There’s a pair of fancy satin breeches that button at the knee, and fine stockings and stitched leather shoes topped with ornate buckles. It looks like something someone out of a hundred-year-old oil portrait would wear.

Jensen gives a mental shrug. It’s not that he has much choice.

The dragon brings the clothes to the bed, but then goes back to rummaging around. 

Jensen eases himself to the side of the bed. He lets his feet hang over the side a moment, distressingly dizzy simply from the process of sitting up. The temptation to lie back down is strong, but Jensen’s stubbornness is stronger. He eases the shirt gingerly over his head, careful not to disturb his stitches. He puts his feet into the stockings and the legs of the breeches. 

“Look at this! Just what you need.” The dragon comes out once more, this time with an old-fashioned cane. It’s standard-sized for a man, but looks like a toothpick in the dragon’s grip. The head is curved, set with an onyx ball the size of a small apple. The wooden stick appears to have small etchings up and down the side. It’s the kind of thing a duke or a baron would carry with him for show as he strolled around Grandcoup’s famous shopping district. “Isn’t it fun? There is so much lovely, antique _stuff_ still in the castle, it’s amazing.”

Jensen nods. He stands to pull up his pants. He wobbles and tilts. 

The dragon darts across the room, suddenly beside him. Jensen’s hand flails out and he finds he’s steadying himself on its shoulder. 

His instinct is to pull away, but the dragon’s skin beneath his hand is like nothing he’s ever felt before. It’s like no leather or pelt or hide, none of those words do justice to the supple smoothness, the glossy warmth like sun-baked marble after rain, a sublime strength like the feel of silk stretched over steel. His hand seems held there on the dragon’s side by some uncanny power, but he can sense no magic other than the extraordinary texture of it under his palm. There’s this strange urge to run his hand down the length of the dragon’s back, stroke up the long arch of its neck. To explore the different feel of the delicate bones and translucent skin of its wings. 

“Will you be alright? Is it too painful? Do you need to lie back down?”

Jensen realizes he’s standing there, trembling like a fool. He forces himself to focus. He’s a soldier, damn it all. Chosen as a member of the Heir’s own guard. “No, no. Just needed a moment to remember what it feels like to be upright.” 

It is painful, no question. His whole torso throbs. But it’s a pain Jensen can handle. He holds out his hand for the cane and plants it firmly in front of him. He starts off, but leaves his hand resting on the dragon.

Together they walk out of the bedroom doors and into the castle’s Great Room. 

There, Jensen discovers a magnificent vision of beauty and decay. Great arching banks of windows filter in the evening sun through grimy panes, illuminating a room large enough to host a ball for every one of LeGeai’s courtiers. Along each wall are rows of unlit sconces festooned with teardrop crystals and cobwebs. The paint is peeling away from a series of pastoral murals decorating the far wall, what appeared to be once vibrant colors now faded. 

As they slowly make their way across the hall, the dragon provides a running commentary on the architecture and conjectures on when the castle was originally constructed, pointing out little details so proudly one would think it had designed the castle single-handedly. “Note the unusual inverted vaulted ceilings.” 

Jensen looks up, glimpses what appears to be the tangled twigs of several birds’ nests tucked into the cornices. 

“You could really use a housekeeper,” he remarks, “or, even better, a whole staff.”

The dragon sighs. “You’re not wrong. I wish it was safe—oh!” It halts, and thus so does Jensen. They’ve come to the foot of a grand staircase, as wide and shallow as advertised. It curves gracefully upward, flanked by balusters and rails elaborately carved into curlicues and flourishes, some of which have broken off, leaving vacant gaps like a brawler’s smile. “I’d forgotten that we need to go upstairs.”

“You’d forgotten?” Jensen asks wryly. 

“Well, I was so excited about you getting up and around. There’s so much you haven’t seen and I don’t get to share it with many people. That is, with _anyone_ … other than your father.”

“No one has been here but us?” 

“Do you really think there are many of your fellow countrymen who are eager to associate with a dragon? I know your accounts of us, the fear and rage people feel. Your reaction in the courtyard when you arrived was quite predictable. If I had any visitors, they would likely be bearing torches and pitchforks.”

“I see your point.”

The dragon looks longingly up the stairs, and then back at Jensen. “Would you—“ it clears its throat with a little cough, “—would you mind if I carried you?”

“Carry me?” Jensen echoes. 

“Well, you don’t weigh much. To me. I—uh—you’re just the right weight for a human, of course. And it’s not as if I’d drop you. And then you wouldn’t wear yourself out. And we wouldn’t have to stay very long, if you start to feel poorly.”

Jensen finds he’s incredibly curious about what the dragon could be so excited to show him. Curious enough, it seems, to agree to such an outlandish proposal. Horses carry him around every day, he tells himself. This is only slightly different. 

He glances at his companion. Only slightly.

“I suppose you could.”

Jensen had thought he might ride on the dragon’s back, much like a horse. But instead, it rises onto its hind legs and effortlessly scoops Jensen up in its arms like a babe, or a young bride. They take the steps four at a time, the dragon clearly making an effort both to go swiftly and not to jostle him. 

When they reach the top, it doesn’t bother to set Jensen down, but carries him the rest of the way down the long hall. They stop at a nondescript set of doors much like the ones downstairs, exceptionally wide and twice as tall as normal. Jensen tries and fails to imagine what might be behind them.

The dragon swings them open dramatically. And inside Jensen beholds a library.

The room itself is two stories high, with shelves of books that run up each wall like building blocks, the spines of the volumes a riot of color and size. The dragon’s beloved vaulted ceilings are repeated in here, and there’s a walkway halfway up the wall that circles the entire room. Ladders—taller than Jensen’s has ever seen—extend up the shelves, stretching into the highest heights. Books. Scads of books. Mountains of books. More books than Jensen thinks anyone could ever be able to read in a lifetime.

His host sets him down, then spins around happily looking up at the shelves as if this were _its_ first time seeing them all. Then it turns to Jensen, its face beaming with pride.

Jensen blurts out, “I can't believe it. I've never seen so many books in all my life!” 

“You—you like it?” the dragon asks, hesitant and hopeful.

“It’s—“ Jensen searches for the right word. “—astonishing.”

Jensen thinks back to the handful of books they owned when he was a child. All of them were on the subject of his father’s sole passion. How Jensen had grown to hate them, as he hated all things that dealt with dragons. It was as if each new book they acquired stole another piece of his father’s attention away. 

“Do you like to read?” His host is so eager, so clearly wants Jensen to join its enthusiasm. 

“Yes, of course,” Jensen lies. Although it doesn’t have to be a lie. Maybe he could learn to like reading. With all these books to choose from, how could he not find something with a topic more to his taste?

A wave of fatigue sweeps over him, and he shuffles over to a nearby chair, sits carefully down. He glances across the room to where the dragon is absently humming while it fusses with a shelf, rearranging a set of leather-bound tomes. Jensen thinks, _Or maybe I’ve been reading the wrong books about dragons._

 

***

 

That night, Jensen lies awake, trying to calculate how soon he might be fit enough to get back to Grandcoup, back to the Palace. The evening’s jaunt to the library had demonstrated the current limits of his strength, but he actually felt better about the progress of his healing than he would’ve imagined. Lead shot in the side is no light matter; he most certainly would’ve died had he not stumbled upon the dragon’s castle. And the fact that he is up and walking so soon—he sends up a silent, grateful thought to the dragon and its tea—gives him hope that he’ll be able to return to the Court before it’s too late to help. 

The next morning he deliberately eats heartily of the breakfast the dragon provides, drinking enough of the medicinal tea to float a navy.

His host nods approvingly and gathers the dishes onto a clever little wheeled cart to avoid having to carry many things at once back the kitchens. It shoves the cart to set it rolling and follows along after it, nudging it every few feet to keep it moving. Jensen certainly doesn’t find the process charming. 

The dragon tosses a comment to Jensen over its shoulder as it passes through the door, “I’m not sure you need me to help you get around anymore, so you should free to explore. Like I said, the walking will do you good.” Its voice wafts back into the bedroom. “Just call for me if you get overly-tired. And be sure to avoid the West Wing.”

“What's in the West Wing?” Jensen asks, but the dragon must be too far away to hear him, because there’s no reply.

Needless to say, it’s only minutes before Jensen is up and, with the assistance of his cane, making a beeline for the West Wing. Nothing conquers boredom like a mystery. Nothing’s going to encourage Jensen to exert himself more than a quest. Whatever it is the dragon wants to hide, it’s probably the most interesting thing to be found in this derelict ruin.

He takes a different angle across the Great Hall and discovers a wide corridor with a threadbare runner along the floor and blank squares on the walls outlining where pieces of art once must have hung. At the end of the hall is another ballroom, another staircase, just as grand and sprawling and dilapidated as the ones from yesterday. But this time there’s no handy porter to carry Jensen up them. 

He takes them slowly, one at a time.

He nearly topples over when the section of rail he’s holding snaps in his right hand, but, after a deep calming breath, he makes it to the landing at the top successfully. There he finds some of the worst disrepair yet. The parquet flooring is rippled and uneven, pocked alternately with dusty heaps of fallen plaster and holes that show all the way through into midair. 

Jensen steps forward tentatively, but in that first step, his foot goes crashing through the floor as if it was paper. Even though he’d been half anticipating it, Jensen stumbles forward, and the edge of the landing actually crumbles away underneath him. He flails out with both hands, trying to catch himself before he plunges 40 feet to the floor below. Somehow his cane becomes lodged between two newels of the railing and he finds himself dangling perilously from it over the edge.

“Jared!” Jensen shouts, praying desperately that the dragon is in earshot. He feels his ribs grind and his weak grip gives way.

He slips, starts to plummet. But then Jared is somehow there, faster than a lightning strike, launching from the floor, flying across the room, giant wings outspread. The dragon catches Jensen in midair but doesn’t have enough time or room to maneuver, so it flips them, and together they crash to the ground, Jared twisting so that Jensen lands on top.

They’re both still for a few long seconds, stunned, catching their breaths, dust from the debris swirling around them. Jensen’s sprawled across the dragon’s chest and he rocks as if on a dinghy as Jared gasps for air. Jared’s arms are up around Jensen, cradling him, protective. It strikes Jensen suddenly that, although this is clearly not a man underneath him, it’s not an animal, either. 

Eventually, Jensen rolls away, landing on his feet but gripping his knees with his hands to gather himself, the surge of adrenaline and fear leaving him shaky. He glances up at Jared carefully spreading out his wings, looking much like Jensen feels.

In unison, they both ask, “Are you alright?” 

Jensen nods first. The dragon looks at him skeptically, searchingly, but then nods back.

“I guess that’s why I should avoid the West Wing,” Jensen says apologetically. 

“And I guess I should have mentioned that the entire structure here is unsound.”

“I guess so.” 

“I came back to your room and you were gone and I was so alarmed, I raced back out to look for you,” Jared gushes, his voice starting to regain its normal animation. “But before I could do a thing, I heard this loud crack, and I realized you were in the West Wing and my heart almost stopped. You’ve could’ve been killed!” 

“But I wasn’t,” Jensen soothes. He feels the urge to reach out and touch, to—to clap a hand on the dragon’s shoulder—or—something, just to reassure him. “I wasn’t even hurt. Thanks to you.” 

“I’m glad you called out.” The dragon looks away back down the hall, and then down at the ground. More softly, he mumbles, “I’m glad you called me by name. You can, you know. Even when it’s not an emergency.”

“Okay,” Jensen says. Then he huffs a small laugh, realizing that he’s already made the mental shift. “I can do that.”

 

***

 

Jared herds him back to his room like a watchdog with one sheep, insisting they go slow, asking every few steps if Jensen wouldn’t prefer to be carried, or stop to rest. Once they arrive, there’s more fussing, the pulling back of blankets and helping Jensen ease down to sit on the bed. Jared hurries to fetch a large woven basket from one of the nearby tables and brings it over. He goes to open it, then pauses a long moment before simply setting it down on Jensen’s bedside table. 

“Here,” he says, not looking Jensen in the eye. “If you think you might need to change the dressing on your wound, you can. I’ll make more tea.” 

The dragon slips away to his usual place by the hearth. 

Jensen reaches over and opens the top of the basket to find rolls of fresh bandages and pads of gauze, a glass jar half-full of a yellowish ointment, and delicate silver scissors. Jensen recalls his feeling of disgust at the idea of Jared touching him while treating his wounds during his fever. He should be glad for the dragon’s current respect for his privacy, and for a relief from the cosseting. But as he shrugs out of his shirt and clumsily unwraps the old dressing, he acknowledges that help wouldn’t actually be unwelcome. 

The shot struck him high on the ribs up under one arm, and the awkward twist he has to make as he reaches for it stings like a lashing. But his stitches appear sound and he doesn’t seem to be much the worse for wear from either dangling from the ledge or the fall. He quickly slathers his entire side with the salve and cuts a length of bandage, binding everything back up as best he can. It’s sloppy, no better than a field dressing, and Jensen again can’t help but think about how much better it would’ve come out had Jared helped. Even if his talons are much too large to wield the scissors or fit inside the ointment jar.

The rest of the morning goes by quickly because Jared unearths an old chessboard from some other part of the castle and sets it up at Jensen’s bedside. It’s missing a couple of pieces, but Jared rustles up the half-melted stub of a candle and a tiny hourglass as substitutes, and they begin to play. The board is sized for humans, which makes it hard for Jared to maneuver his pieces without knocking everything over. So he takes to calling out his moves to Jensen from across the room as he putters around, at one point simultaneously reading a recipe, shelling peas, and stirring a pot of soup with his tail. 

"My Queen to King's Rook five, please."

It’s a bit embarrassing. Jensen considers himself a decent player—adept even—but Jared whips him handily the first round, despite his lack of attention. Jensen fares better the second contest, playing the dragon down to a handful of pieces before Jared manages a swift endgame with an outside passed pawn. Deep into the third round, Jensen thinks he has him beat, but Jared surprises him once more and Jensen throws up his hands, knocking over his king in surrender.

“One more round,” Jensen demands. “I swear, I will best you.” 

But ever since the noon hour came and passed, Jared has been looking every few minutes out the window, judging the angle of the sun. “I—um—I have something I must attend to soon. Nothing important really. Just a routine chore. I’m afraid I’ll be preoccupied most of the afternoon,” Jared says, busily attempting to tidy the mess on the table, stacking up dishes and piling some books too high, sending them tumbling. The dragon is really quite bad at covering up the fact that he doesn’t want to tell Jensen exactly what he’s doing. 

“That’s fine,” Jensen replies, flopping back against the headboard. He pats his side tenderly. “I’ll just languish here alone.”

“Do you need me to stay?” And Jared’s quick concern makes a small corner of Jensen’s heart warm. He’s never had anyone—that he can remember, at least—so willing to put Jensen’s needs before their own. It’s nice. 

Jensen reminds himself not to get used to it. It’s not as if he’s staying. “No, no. I was teasing. I’m feeling fine. Or as fine as it gets at the moment.”

“Alright, I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Jared pins him with a stern look. “You rest.”

The dragon is gone less than an hour before Jensen gets bored with the books by his bedside and realizes he doesn’t feel like napping. He gets up, his muscles a little sore from the fall in the West Wing, maybe one or two new bruises forming, but overall much better than even this morning. He’s healing. It won’t be long now.

He wanders over to chaise where his clothes are piled, and discovers that the damage isn’t as bad as he feared. The waistcoat is a loss, and the undershirt, too, but the coat itself could be worn, if he tucks the loose bits of fabric around the hole inside. And the coat would cover the stains on the trousers if he keeps it buttoned. At least they’ll fit better than the ancient finery Jared had found for him.

He quickly changes, into all except the boots, because while he might get them on, he’d likely have trouble pulling them off again without Jared’s help. And he doesn’t think Jared will approve of this outing when he’d specifically prescribed more rest.

Jensen slips his feet back into the leather shoes, decides he can forgo the cane, and makes his way outside.

He glances around the empty courtyard, then decides to head toward the stables. The mare he’d stolen on his way out of the capital is there, her stall clean, fresh hay in the rack. He feels a pang of guilt over taking her, and makes a silent vow to try to hunt down her owner and pay twice her worth in recompense. She whinnies as Jensen approaches and he worries that she’s been too cooped up for her own good. How much has Jared let her out to graze? 

Jensen figures it will not hurt to give her some exercise, just around the lawn. And Jared said walking was good for his own healing as well.

He grabs a simple headstall from the wall and drapes it over her, briefly scritching at the blaze in the middle of her forehead. Together, they walk out into the warm afternoon sun. Every so often the horse stops to crop at a tuft of grass, and Jensen decides to steer her away from the gardens, lest she eat something out of Jared’s elaborate works that would either upset her stomach or the dragon’s feelings.

They wander for awhile, Jensen trying to gauge how long he can stay out before he’ll be too tired to walk himself back to the guest room. That would not go over well.

But just as he thinks of turning back to the stables, he sees movement from the corner of his eye and spots a man making his way stealthily through the front gate. He’s leading a pack mule loaded with saddlebags. There is something familiar about him: his height, his hair shaggy, with whisps sneaking out from under the edges of his cap. Jensen releases the horse, giving her a silent slap on the flank to send her out of sight into the hedge maze. He edges slowly around so that he’s hidden behind a tree trunk as the stranger comes toward his position. The man is acting suspiciously, glancing furtively in each direction as he makes his way across the lawn, heading toward the castle. 

Jared had made no mention of visitors. In fact, he’d specifically said that Jensen and his father were the only humans who had been to the castle for at least a score of years. The man has no business here, and Jensen will be damned if he lets any harm come to Jared after all his kindness. Just the thought of someone stealing Jared’s things, of _hurting_ him, makes Jensen see red.

Jensen only has moments to decide on a course of action. The prudent thing would be to follow the man inside, try to trap him, at least delay him, until Jared’s return. Or do nothing at all, but to wait for Jared and warn him before he ever enters the house. Because not only is Jensen wounded, but all he carries with him is a short, ornate bodkin on his belt that he’d donned automatically. At Court, it’s meant as adornment or, at most, for paring an apple. Thank god he at least has that. It’s barely a weapon, but it will have to do. 

Jensen’s never had much use for waiting.

The decision is made for him when the route the stranger takes brings him right past Jensen’s hiding place. He’s a big man, taller than Jensen, and the element of surprise is going to be the only thing that wins the day. So Jensen times it carefully, so carefully, until the man passes by. 

Jensen rushes at him from behind, tackling him to the ground, and holds the blade to his neck. Under his grip, the man goes unexpectedly still. He doesn’t struggle, merely holds his hands up in surrender. 

It’s him. The man from Jensen’s fevered visions. The one who came to him as he lay dying. Somehow he’s real and he’s lying on the ground with Jensen’s hand around his neck. The sunlight from the south catches auburn highlights in his hair, tied back in a queue with a long black ribbon. 

“Who are you?” Jensen demands. “What are you doing here?”

And if the man’s appearance isn’t astonishing enough, his words are even moreso. 

“Jensen!” he says. “Please stop! You’ll reinjure yourself. Or you’ll injure me, which I don’t much care about as long as it’s not lethal, but instead of either of those, if you hold on, I can explain.” His brow is creased with worry, and Jensen can’t help but notice the way his chest heaves under his grip. He’s just as beautiful as he was in Jensen’s dream. 

“How do you know my name?” Jensen snarls, angry now. This is no figment of his imagination. What does he know of Jensen? Or of Jared? What right had he to handle Jensen as he lay insensate? Or to be here now?

“I know this may seem impossible, but I’m Jared. This—this is simply a different form, one I can take at will for short periods of time when I need to.”

“I don’t believe you.” Jared had told Jensen he had very little magic. This is so much more than making dinner plates appear to dance. The flesh and bone beneath his hands is no illusion.

“Stand aside. I’ll show you.” 

“This is a ruse. You’ll run,” Jensen says.

“No. I’m not going anywhere.” The man smiles softly. It’s Jared’s smile. Jensen peers more closely into the man’s eyes, green and azure with a burst of gold at the center. And with a sudden certainty, Jensen knows who this is. 

Jensen pulls the knife away. He rolls back onto his heels, and jerks away when the stranger—when _Jared_ —grabs him by the arm to support him as he struggles to stand. 

They face each other in silence for a moment, Jensen waiting, the man looking as if he’s making a decision. At last, he begins to… by god, this man who claims he’s Jared starts to strip. He shrugs off his coat, starts undoing his plain cravat, unbuttoning his shirt.

“What the hell are you doing?” Jensen says, praying it doesn’t come out as a squeak, because, too quickly, the man’s torso is bared and he’s reaching for the fastenings on his breeches. 

“I apologize if nakedness makes you uncomfortable, but if I turn back into my true form now, I’ll ruin these clothes.” Jensen can see he’s trying for nonchalant, but he’s biting nervously at his lips, and a rosy blush starts high in his cheeks and flows down his neck. He pulls off low boots and peels out of the breeches and undergarments. “There may be closets full of discarded clothes in the castle but it’s quite difficult to find things that fit a body this tall. Even the ones we found to fit you were a pleasant surprise, as you are taller than most humans I’ve met.”

The man steps back from the pile of clothing and Jensen can’t help but gape, feasting his eyes on him. There is not a single ancient statue, not one dancing boy from the City’s most expensive gambling dens that can match the perfection of this man’s form. The etched lines of each muscle, the slim hips, the long, elegant limbs, the carnal beauty of his soft cock nestled gently in a thatch of silky curls.

As Jensen watches, the outline of the man seems to waver, to break up as a reflection breaks when a stone is thrown into a pond. Jensen blinks and he realizes he’s no longer looking at a man, but a lithe green dragon. Jared. 

Jensen’s heart is racing as if he’d run a hundred stairs. He wants to reach out and touch Jared, confirm that he’s solid, substantial, the beast and not the man. Or maybe he is both. Jensen shakes his head slowly in disbelief. “Is this another of your illusions?” 

“No. It’s true transformation, not illusion. This is something that all dragons can do. At least, as far as I know we all can.” Jared looks at him warily, and it’s as if faces of the man and the dragon are overlayed upon one another, Jensen can see both in the creature’s appearance. The sharp nose, the wide, expressive mouth, the graceful arcs of his brows over slanted eyes. It’s amazing, and disconcerting, and so impossible that Jensen knows not what to do.

“Why didn’t you tell me? Why has this never been mentioned before in my father’s studies?” he asks.

“How would most humans react,” Jared asks in return, “if they knew dragons could walk among them undetected? I didn’t tell you because it is not my secret to tell. It’s one that belongs to all dragons and protects us against discovery. Most never bother to use this skill, having no interest in associating with humans in the first place. Some think it’s an abomination.” He looks at Jensen sadly, his wings drooping. “In that, I suspect you’re in agreement.”

Jensen can’t answer that charge right now, still off-balance and astounded. “Does my father know?”

“Yes, that’s the true story how we met. I go down the mountain to visit the human villages with some frequency, like today, when I need to trade for things—tools, books—that I can’t get otherwise. Or just to observe people, to sit in company at a bar and share in some of your comradeship. Alan was at the same tavern as I was one night. A group fell into conversation, including me. As you know, your father is a rare student of dragonkin. Even in my human form, he suspected I was—was not quite like other men. I was careless that night. He followed me out of the tavern and into the forest, where I changed form to fly home. He confronted me. I’m lucky he was one of the very few men who is friend and not foe.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Jensen asks again, knowing that isn’t the important point at the moment, but wanting more explanation.

“It’s not a secret shared lightly. All our precepts forbid it. And, if I’m being honest, I wasn’t sure what you would say. You already hated me so violently when we first met. And then—and then it seemed like you were… beginning to hate me less.” The dragon looks away, fixing his gaze somewhere above Jensen’s left shoulder. “Staying in human form is difficult, draining. I can only remain like that for a short period of time. I only do it when I must. It was hard to tend to your injuries in this form.” He flexes his long claws, so capable, but still huge and cumbersome compared to human hands. “So I shifted then. I did not mean for you to find out.”

Jensen turns away without response. He doesn’t know what to say. It feels like the pain of his wound has migrated deep into the center of his chest. He hobbles like an old man into the opening of the hedge to track down and retrieve the mare. 

He doesn’t look back at Jared.

 

***

 

He has no idea why, but he’s suddenly, fiercely _angry_.

The leafy, breeze-rippled walls of the maze don’t soothe him. No, he’s more enraged with every step. He should have _known_ dragons were liars. Known that magic was not as innocent as Jared had insisted. Known that Jared would deceive him, deceive his father. Why else has Jensen been tempted to stay here when he should have left days ago, healed or not? He should never have let his growing ease in Jared’s company blind him to the vast gulf between them. He should never let himself befriend such a beast. Never forget his duty, and remain here in comfort while LeGeai might be burning to the ground.

Jensen’s steps come faster and faster until he’s practically running down the path. And if a voice in his head whispers that it’s not forgotten duty that has him so agitated, he shuts it out.

He discovers the mare around a blind turn. He catches himself on her mane as he stumbles and nearly falls. 

The horse. He has to go. He can’t stay here. Can’t look at Jared and see the other man. See what a dragon looks like in human form. See himself reflected back in Jared’s earnest eyes. 

He has to escape.

 

***

 

Jensen steals a quick look around the courtyard from the edge of the maze before emerging but Jared isn’t there anymore. 

He hurries the mare back to the stable and quickly gathers up all the gear he can. He finds a saddlebag and stuffs in a canteen of water, a spare saddle blanket, an old cloak hanging on a peg. As he lifts the cloak up, he discovers his pistols in their holsters hanging there too and seizes them gratefully. Although the powder is probably wet and useless and he has no other cartridges or shot, he buckles them on nonetheless. 

Getting the horse saddled is painful enough that it should be an unmistakable warning sign to Jensen that he’s in no shape for a journey. Thank god the animal is docile, because Jensen’s trembling by the time he has blanket, saddle, bags, bit, and bridle situated. Just for a minute, he lets his forehead rest against her neck, trying to ignore the blunt ache every time he takes a breath. And if he leads the mare over to a nearby stepstool like a child to make it easier to hook a foot into the stirrup and heave himself up into place, well. There’s no one here to witness it.

He kicks her into a canter and out of the stables, fleeing south toward the forest beyond. 

What will Jared do when he discovers Jensen’s gone? Will he be angry? 

Jensen actually had trouble picturing it. After years of hearing about the evil, vengeful nature of dragons, the one real dragon he knows seems much more like a overgrown puppy than an ogre. Even when Jensen had accidentally dropped a cup from the beloved tea set and left a chip in its slender lip, Jared had barely blinked. If he hadn’t raged about that, Jensen can’t imagine him getting angry over anything.

Or instead will he be hurt? Jensen allows himself a quick glance over his shoulder as the horse passes under the iron gates, taking in the stillness of the great castle. How quiet it will be when Jared stops considerately giving him space—for Jensen knows in his heart that’s what the dragon is doing—and calls out for him. How his voice will echo with no answer. 

Jensen turns to face the south. He’s forced to travel much more slowly than he normally would. It takes the rest of the afternoon and into the evening to get down the mountain, even without stopping for more than to fill his water flask and rest the horse.

Eventually he stops on a low crest as the gathering gloom hides the individual trunks of the trees and covers the gullies with shadow. A gust of wind catches the edge of his borrowed—stolen, he corrects himself—cloak and whips it out behind him. He’d hoped to make it all the way down to the outskirts of the farming villages by now, but he is still in the depths of forest. 

He has a brief sense of déjà vu. The pain in his side, the dusk, the horse’s weariness, his own. He may have been just yards from this same path when he’d labored up the opposite direction just a few days before. 

He knows he shouldn’t press on, that one wrong step could lame his mount or send him tumbling. And he has no desire to take another fall. But the fear of what may be unfolding below and the turmoil over what he left above makes him determined to chance it.

He swings a leg over the horse’s withers and slides to standing. He won’t make as good time afoot, but leading the mare is a considerably safer course of action. His muscles scream in protest as he dismounts, the hours spent in the saddle having frozen them in place. He starts off again, hoping the walk will work out the soreness.

But the combination of exhaustion and the need to focus on where each foot is placed is his undoing. Distracted, he doesn’t notice the change in the forest sounds until the moment he stumbles, pushing past a tangled coppice of branches into a small open clearing. It conceals a campsite of soldiers, only a half a dozen of them together, but more than enough to subdue him. There’s a small fire—even in his reverie Jensen should have noticed the smell—and the remains of what appear to be a meal are spread out around the periphery. This close, Jensen can smell the sharp tang of the ale in the open cask that sits on the ground. 

Before he can react, the soldiers surround him. They rip the lead rein from his hands and strip him of his pistols and knife. 

They’re wearing the livery of LeGeai’s army and he recognizes a couple of goons—Olsson, and that craven scut, Wade—from a squad of armsmen relegated to the city night patrol. Several other faces are vaguely familiar. Another man rises from where he’d been sitting on a log, standing up slowly, languidly. Jensen knows this one too well. 

Jensen remembers when he first joined the service, that his father warned him away from Pellegrino. In fact, he’d pulled strings to make sure Jensen’s postings were far away from the man. Pellegrino had been a sergeant way before Jensen joined the guard, but Jensen had long since surpassed him in rank. Few talked about why Pellegrino languished in the common patrol duty, but Jensen suspected something to do with the petty criminals and prostitutes that mysteriously disappeared on his watch. For a long time, commanders had trouble finding men to serve with him, but slowly he’d gathered some of the dregs of the service into his orbit, and it’s among them Jensen finds himself held captive.

“What have we here? If it isn’t Handsome Jen,” Pellegrino purrs, voice dripping with ill-intent. “The comeliest man in Her Majesty’s service.” 

Jensen despises that ridiculous nickname. He was given it by his own sergeant on the day he enlisted, downy-cheeked and lamentably pretty. It had stuck for many years, until he’d gained a level of respect and reputation throughout the corps. Now if anyone still used it, they usually did so behind his back. 

“That’s Captain Ackles to you,” Jensen retorts. 

Pellegrino ignores the challenge. “Aren’t you supposed to be dead? We were sent to search for you, you little prick, but I’d given up on finding anything but your rotting corpse.” He grabs Jensen’s chin, yanking it up, and Jensen cannot stop the spasm of disgust at the man’s touch. He jerks away as best he can in the vicious hold Pellegrino’s men have on his arms, wrenched behind his back. But two of them are covering him with his own pistols, so it’s not as if he has any chance of escape.

“I guess that’s one more thing Alaina couldn’t get right,” Jensen spits out anyway. “And how did you end up as that traitor’s dogsbody? Skulking around in the wilderness in the middle of the night?” 

All it takes is one punch to the ribs to make Jensen fold in on himself like a struck tent. If Pellegrino’s men weren’t holding him up, he’d have dropped straight to the ground.

Pellegrino leans in, and the foul wash of his ale-tainted breath over Jensen’s face makes bile rise in the back of his throat. “We’ve been in these god-forsaken woods for days.” He mercifully steps back, starts to pace around the clearing. He kicks at a stray tin cup lying on its side in the grass and sends it hurtling off into the bushes. “That bitch Alaina has the royal palace sealed as tight as a virgin’s asshole, and Amanda’s oldest whelp and his armies have her surrounded. The only thing stopping him from tearing the place to the ground is hostages.” He turns his attention back to Jensen. “Hostages like his brother. Like your father,” he draws the word out slowly, and then grins. “And now you.” 

Jensen holds himself carefully still and blank. He soaks up every word. It’s almost as if he’d forgotten that the world outside of Jared’s castle existed. This past week has been a folly; the world of the Court and the Queen’s sons are all that matters now.

He stares at his captor, willing the man to keep talking. _Say more about my father and the Prince, you pox-riddled cur. Tell me where they are._

But Pellegrino merely steps close and hits Jensen again, a fist to the face with nothing held back. Jensen’s head snaps on his neck and the blast of pain that echoes through his core reminds him that a few days of recovery from his wound was not enough. If they mean to torture him, he won’t last long enough to give them a good show.

Heaving for breath through the pain, Jensen hears one of the other men say, “Don’t damage him too bad, Mark. ‘e’s got to be in good enough shape to trade him to ‘Er Highness for something.”

“I think alive is all that’s necessary.” Pellegrino smirks, cupping the back of Jensen’s head in a sick imitation of a lover’s caress. With the tip of one finger, he traces Jensen’s abused cheekbone and then slides down his jaw. “When I’m done with our ‘Handsome Jen,’ he’s not going to be so handsome anymore.”

He shoves Jensen back and strides over to the campfire, grabbing up a piece of kindling that smolders ruby-red at the tip. Jensen starts to struggle desperately against the hold of the men, bucking and kicking out his legs. He knows with Pellegrino this is not a bluff. This ends with Jensen branded and disfigured.

Jensen’s eyes are transfixed on the end on that burning branch as Pellegrino saunters back, waving it slowly back and forth in front of him. 

But just before he gets within reach, a roar like the mountain falling down around them resounds from overhead. Then there’s a deafening, drumming sound of wings, and the dragon attacks with a hiss and a gout of yellow-white flame that illuminates the glade like a lightning strike. A surge of heat rolls over all of them, but the flames only strike the man farthest from Jensen. They set his clothes and hair on fire, his skin melting grotesquely in the incandescent heat.

His screams combine with the shouts of Pellegrino and his remaining men as they drop to their knees or try to scramble away. Jared lands, lashing at two of the men with his tail, sending them crashing to the ground. He picks up Pellegrino with one claw and flings him like a ragdoll into the trunk of a nearby tree. His wings spread wide, he blocks out the sky, he blocks out the earth.

A guardsman holding one of Jensen’s pistols fires on Jared, but the shot goes wide. Yet another has crawled to his gear and found a musket. The blast catches Jared in one wing, ripping a hole five inches wide through the tender skin. 

“No!” The cry rips from Jensen’s throat, drowned out by Jared’s own agonized shriek. The sound cuts into Jensen like a blade, but the wound doesn’t stop the dragon from fighting on. 

Jared’s teeth flash white in the light of a burning scrub at the far end of the glade that was set alight in the initial blast of dragon flame. His neck whips around and he darts in, slashing at the musketeer’s arm. Everything is chaos as another man screams, another shot rings out. Jensen feels a burst of wind as the ball passes just inches from his ear.

Jared rears up, his full height almost to the top of trees, and launches himself toward the night sky, spouting fire once more to cover his retreat. Jensen cries out as Jared’s great rear talons strike him, clutching him around the middle and lifting him into the air with him, like an eagle with a hare. The claws don’t puncture Jensen’s skin, but the grip is painful, unbreakable and he thrashes against it instinctively. 

“Stop… Jensen…. stop!” Jared shouts, his voice coming in harsh gasps over the rush of wind. They bob up and down erratically through the air like a storm-tossed ship, Jared’s shredded wing keeping him from either gliding or gaining altitude. They falter, stagger, clinging to the side of the mountain. Jensen’s feet scrape the tops of trees he can barely see in the feeble light from the quarter-moon, his head whirling like a leaf in a gale, afraid he might black out. They fly upward, over outcroppings of rock a short, fatal drop away. 

Jensen can still see the fire from the battle burning in the forest behind them when Jared’s flight finally falters. He’s only gotten them barely a league away when he drops from the air through an open break in the treetops. It’s a small cup of land, a dimple in the mountain’s face, but Jared manages to set Jensen down gently in it. Then the dragon himself tumbles onto the ground with a rough crash, spent.

Jensen finds himself clinging to the grass, his fingers digging deep into the soft soil. He drags in what feels like his first breath in an hour, shivering in delayed reaction. 

They’re safe. Jared saved them both.

“Damn,” he hears the dragon mutter. “They know I’m here now.” 

Jensen rolls to his side and then onto his knees, his own pain and fear dismissed, his anger at Jared’s secret magic forgotten. All he knows is that Jared’s been shot. Jared is hurt. “Your wing! What were you doing? You could’ve died!” 

He doesn’t bother getting up, just crawls to Jared’s side. The dragon is curled up as he is wont to do, but he has his injured wing extended out to the side. Jared turns his head and his long tongue snakes out to lick delicately at the wound. Blood oozes sluggishly down one boney ridge and onto the ground. 

Jensen doesn’t know what to do. He rests a hand on Jared’s shoulder as a gesture of comfort. He can feel Jared’s body trembling. “Can you not fly home?”

“No,” Jared replies, his voice thready. “And I wouldn’t leave you here alone even if I could.” He goes back to licking.

“What if I went back to seek out one of the loose horses?” Jensen suggests. “Could you shift to your human form, and mount and ride?” 

“No,” Jared says, more firmly this time, urgent. “It’s too much of a risk. You’re as likely to stumble back into your captors’ hands as find a horse. Besides, I heal much more quickly in my true form than in the other. By morning I should be—if not completely mended—essentially fine.”

Jensen doesn’t bother arguing about his own safety, even though he’s certain Pellegrino and his men were either dead or long gone. And good riddance. 

“I’m so sorry,” Jared says. 

Jensen almost misses the words, they’re said so quietly, and Jared still has his head turned away. “What?”

“The way I acted. Back there. I told you that dragons are not violent or bloodthirsty. And then I—I attacked those men. Probably—“ he pauses, draws in a deep breath, then continues, “—probably killed many of them. But they _took_ you, were going to _burn_ you, or worse. The thought of it made me, I don’t know, berserk. I just reacted without thinking. Please, I don’t want you to be afraid of me. Or hate me again. I just couldn’t let—couldn’t…” Jared trails off. “I’m sorry.”

“Hey,” Jensen says. “Look at me.” Jared keeps his head low, but Jensen can see the glint of the moon off his eyes as he flicks his gaze sideways. “Don’t apologize. They were scum and they deserved it. I’m in your debt.”

“No,” Jared whispers. 

“Well, then, I am at least very, very grateful.” 

Jared doesn’t respond, and Jensen fears that he’s hurt worse than he’s letting on. He looks around, can’t see more than a few feet into the wood. He shivers, the cold seeping into his own barely-healed wound as well as his new bruises. But for all he still aches, the gunshot to Jared’s wing is fresh. “You sleep,” Jensen says. “I will keep watch.”

“There is no need. They will not find us.” 

Jensen realizes that, if Jared tucks in his wing, curled as he is, he resembles nothing so much as a stray hillock, his coloring concealing him in the darkness. Pellegrino’s men would have to step on him before they discovered he was there. 

Jensen’s not so lucky. His cream-colored jacket with its piping stands out against the background, as does the white linen undershirt. He shivers, just now realizing that he lost his cloak somewhere during the ordeal. Under normal circumstances, he would’ve resigned himself to sleeping on the bare ground. But right now he can feel himself on the verge of fevered relapse, woozy and weak. His capture and then that insane flight—he hasn’t even had the chance to process the fact that he _flew_ —has taken what little reserves he’d stored up earlier in the day. Was it really just that morning he’d been feeling so strong? 

But Jared needs him now, and it’s his turn to be the bulwark.

Jensen sits back on his haunches, swaying at little, unable to settle on a course of action.

Jared snakes his head toward Jensen, murmurs lowly. “If you—if it would not offend you, you can rest here next to me. Under my wing it will be warmer. We can stay until the sun rises, and then make our way back home.”

 _Home._ It has been a long time since Jensen had a particular place he thought of as ‘home.’ The armsmen’s barracks, maybe. The Palace, not really. Even as a young boy, he’d always thought of the little cottage where he’d been raised as ‘his father’s house.’

Jared lifts up his good wing and waits. There’s a cozy hollow there against Jared’s side, framed by his left forearm and leg. 

Jensen tells himself that this is unwise. He’s still so conflicted over what he knows and what thought he knew. His life as a soldier up ‘til now has always been so straightforward, but the dragon confuses him, jumbles up everything inside his head. Yet Jensen’s heart yearns inexplicably for the closeness and his brain cannot override it. 

He crouches down and slides in to cuddle up against Jared. Jared tucks his wing down over them both. In close quarters, the dragon smells warm and sweet, like honeyed bread from the oven. But underneath there’s also the disturbing tang of copper from Jared’s wound. Jensen dares to lean his head against the dragon’s extraordinary, satiny skin, closing his eyes and listening to the steady thump of Jared’s heartbeat. Slower than his own, but regular, soothing, alive.

“By the way,” Jensen whispers, not even sure Jared can hear him. “Thank you for saving my life.”

The gentle reply thrums in his ear. “You're welcome.”

Jensen falls asleep to the rhythm of Jared’s heart. 

 

***

 

Jensen doesn’t wake until a wave of cold air and morning light hits him, his cozy shelter disappearing as Jared pulls back and away in a long stretch. 

Jensen squeezes his eyes shut and lets out a half-conscious grumble of protest, rolling to the side and curling himself up into the snug spot left in the grasses by Jared’s body heat. Mornings have never been his strong suit.

Jared leans down, bringing his head level with Jensen’s, close enough that his breath wafts over Jensen’s face. 

“What’s wrong? Were you injured further in the fracas last night? Why didn’t you tell me? Can you speak?” Jared asks anxiously. 

Jensen uncurls with a sigh, sitting up and glancing blearily in Jared’s direction. “No, I’m fine. Truly, just—“ One side of his mouth twitches up in remembrance of his father’s more rigorous approach to waking him as a youth, which often involved washwater dumped over his head. “—just lazy.”

“Well,” Jared replies uncertainly, “You do have a reason for exhaustion. Can you make it back to the castle? We’re closer than I realized when we landed. If you can call that a landing. Which I don’t, because I consider myself an excellent flyer and a wing with so slight an injury is really no excuse for dumping you here so inelegantly.”

“Jared,” Jensen moans. Of course, the dragon _is_ a morning person… all day long. “Just give me a moment’s peace to shake off sleep and we’ll be on our way.” He yawns, stands, winces at how his abused muscles have tightened during the night. He looks toward the downward slope, the direction of Grandcoup. “The only question is, which way,” he mutters under his breath. 

Jared plans for them to go back to his castle, but according to Pellegrino, the fight for the throne between Brock and Alaina is coming to a head, and his father and Colin are prisoners, likely in grave danger. If Jensen hadn’t been such an idiot last night, he could’ve easily avoided his captors and been in the City by now. 

“I’m such a fool,” Jared says brightly. “Home is only a short walk to the east. I got turned around in the dark and the stress and my silly wing. We can get there and have breakfast in your belly before you know it.” 

Jensen considers his options and concludes that he won’t make it far toward the City on foot with no provisions. Probably most prudent to go back to Jared’s and rest, restock, perhaps borrow the mule he saw Jared leading in yesterday. It wouldn’t be a comfortable or dignified mount, but it would get him back down the mountain faster than walking.

Speaking of walking, there’s no reason the dragon should have to slog his way through the underbrush. 

“You could fly ahead,” Jensen suggests, “and I’ll meet you there.” 

Jared shrugs his wings, fanning them out, and Jensen can see that his injury indeed did heal remarkably fast during the night. But the dragon replies, “I think I’d rather stick here with you. Just in case. For protection.” He glances around. “Even discounting the thugs you ran into last night, you never know what kind of dangerous things live in the forest.”

Jensen looks him up and down and raises an eyebrow. “Pretty sure I know.” 

Jared does that thing where he ducks his head, disconcerted, and Jensen admits maybe it’s too soon to tease about the attack. As the dragon turns to lead the way out of their little clearing, Jensen rolls his shoulders to work the last cricks out. He follows up the slope, hoping Jared knows a shortcut.

 

***

 

It turns out Jared is right, and they are not far from the castle at all. It’s only the matter of a half-hour’s hike and they are back at the gates. 

Jared leads them around to the side of the main hall, where a smaller set of doors—still large enough to accommodate Jared’s bulk—opens into the kitchen area. Inside, the long counters are clear of debris and the shelves that aren’t empty are stacked with plates. Dozens of copper-bottomed pots and pans hang from hooks along the walls like so many pictures. A pile of wood is stacked neatly by the arched fireplace that’s the larger cousin of the one in Jensen’s room. But underneath the surface tidiness, Jensen can see the kitchens are just as ramshackle as the rest of the castle. Tiles on the walls have broken off, many of the cabinets’ doors hang loose or are missing. The whitewashed walls long ago turned a dingy gray. 

But Jensen doesn’t care. He’s just relieved the short trip is over. He takes a seat at one of the stools that line the long island that bisects the room, groaning. Every single one of his joints is reproaching him. He barely notices the familiar pang from the wound in his side over the cacophony.

Jared cocks his head, looking him over, which makes Jensen straighten up as if he’s just fine. The dragon turns away and rummages in the cabinets. Jensen watches with amusement as Jared casually shoots a puff of breath toward the wood stacked under a pot inside the hearth, a thin stream of flame just enough to light it. The amusement turns to respect as he remembers the damage Jared inflicted with his fire the night before.

Jared putters, uncharacteristically silent. Jensen just watches him. The tiny-paned windows above throw a hazy checkerboard of light onto the table in front of him. It’s peaceful.

When a kettle finally whistles, breaking the quiet, Jensen asks, “Does your special tea work on dragons?” 

“I’m not sure, but I don’t need it.” Jared stretches his wing wide and shows Jensen the unmarred, healthy stretch of skin. “I told you, I heal more rapidly than humans. Hmmm, I should really do some research on that, find out if it’s due to metabolism or some other biological processes. I’ve never really had much cause to study it, since I’ve always enjoyed very good health.”

“At least, until you met me,” Jensen says. His stomach flips at the thought of Jared only being hurt because of him.

Jared simply rolls his eyes and plops an armful of dishes down in front of Jensen. “Here’s your tea, and some porridge, and sundry,” he says. “Eat. Food is also important medicine for healing.”

“What about you?” Jensen asks through a huge mouthful. The porridge oats are thick and creamy, covered in cinnamon and dried fruits and nuggets of crystallized sugar. Jensen’s never tasted anything so delicious in his life. “What are you going to eat?” 

Jared is truly an open book, and Jensen can read immediately from his body language that he’s stumbled again on an embarrassing topic.

“Um—“ Jared temporizes. “Dragons only need to eat rarely. Once a week or so. I—um—“ He spins quickly around to poke at the fire, the tip of his tail nearly knocking over everything in front of Jensen. “There’s a flock of goats,” he mumbles, “that I keep at the bottom of the valley beyond.” 

“I see.” Not much Jensen can reply to that. The image in his mind is not one of Jared savagely tearing apart a gory meal, but instead one of him soaring high above the cliffs, the sun glinting off the emerald sheen of his wings before he pulls them in tightly and dives—swift and precise and powerful—the beauty of him out in nature, hunting, thriving, beyond these man-made walls. 

“I just thought of something else,” Jared says abruptly, “that might be helpful. I’ll be back in a moment.” 

He hurries out of the kitchen before Jensen can say another word. 

Jensen sighs, wishing he could avoid making missteps with his host so often. He knows he’s done nothing to deserve all that Jared’s done for him. He turns back to his bowl, devouring every bite, and the apple and plate of crumbly croissants Jared had provided as well. When he’s finished and Jared still hasn’t returned, Jensen crosses his arms and lays his head down, just for a few minutes’ rest. 

He ought to fall asleep right here, what with the soft sunshine and his full belly. But he can’t, his mind itching with the question of where Jared’s gone. Finally, Jensen decides he might as well follow and hoists himself up off the stool.

The kitchens aren’t far from the Great Hall, but Jared’s not there, nor is he in Jensen’s room. Jensen is debating whether it’s worth climbing the stairs to look in the library when he hears, faintly, the flow of running water.

He follows the sound past his room to the half-open door of a chamber farther down the hall. He pushes it wide and steps into what appears to be some combination of fancy dressing room and bath. His gaze darts past a dainty vanity, several oval, full-length mirrors, most of which are tarnished and slivered with cracks, and the castle’s typical dusty chandelier, missing most of its pendants. 

But what seizes his attention is the massive tub situated against one wall. 

Jensen has never seen anything like it. It’s bigger than a horse trough, though not as deep. The sides curve gracefully upwards like the petals of an open flower and from the wisps of steam rising from within, it appears to be filled with hot water.

But it’s Jared—in human form—leaning over the side to turn a crank and stop the rush of water from a spout, that has Jensen most astonished of all.

“Jared? What is this?”

“Oh!” Jared jumps a mile high and spins around. “Oh, Jensen, I know you don’t—I’m sorry for taking this shape, but it’s easier for certain tasks. Like the pump and the faucet, they’re very tricky.” Jared waves his hand toward the tarnished fixtures and a thin conduit of piping that leads from a small cistern to the spout. He starts to edge away, trying to get past Jensen and out of the room. “I’ll go. I’m sorry.”

“No, please,” Jensen blurts out. “I don’t mind.” 

It hasn’t even been a day since he’d seen Jared like this, and yet Jensen had almost forgotten what he looks like as a man. His long hair is loose, tucked back behind his ears. The nearly-sheer fabric of a lightweight cambric shirt stretches over his shoulders and tight across the muscles of his chest. His sleeves are rolled up to the elbow, strong forearms and delicate wrists a strange and compelling contrast. The rough trousers hang down to mid-calf, and his feet are bare.

Jensen quickly drags his gaze away. “I mean, this form you take. It doesn’t offend me. Yesterday I was… surprised. And now, well, I can’t quite wrap my head around how it works, exactly, but there’s no need to apologize.” 

They stand there awkwardly for long seconds, until Jared turns, almost tripping over himself, to show Jensen the tub, the clever system for heating and moving water, the way Jared had figured out how to repair it. 

“And I guess I’m supposed to get in and bathe?” Jensen asks dubiously. While he knows the Queen and many of the aristocracy regularly use such tubs, Jensen’s more accustomed to a thorough wash in a basin each morning and evening. Or perhaps a swim in a creek or lake when he’s particularly dirty. On a lark, when he was younger, he and a group of his cronies from the garrison had gone to explore the allure of a notorious bathhouse in the Harlot’s District, but they’d found it disappointingly dank and squalid. It might be nice to replace that with a more pleasant experience. 

“Yes.” Jared nods. “It should be very therapeutic. Just be sure not to submerge entirely. You want to keep the wound on your side as dry as you can. That’s why I only filled the tub halfway.”

He looks over at Jensen encouragingly, his expression open and bright. Jensen’s certain he’s never met someone so sincere in all his life. Why would he say no to this? 

“Alright,” Jensen says, peeling off his coat. “Thank you. I’ll give it a try.” He looks down at it and frowns at the grass and dirt stains, showing the wear from their adventures last night. 

“If you let me have your clothes,” Jared says. “I can see if I can tidy them up while you wash. I think there might be some dressing gowns in that armoire over there.” 

“That’s not necessary—“ Jensen starts.

“Give it here,” Jared says with a small smile, snatching the coat out of Jensen’s hands before he can protest further.

Jensen’s not exactly going to fight him for it, so he walks over toward the closet Jared indicated and opens one of the doors cautiously, in case of more moths. Nothing flies out, though, and inside Jensen finds a row of robes on hangers and folded stacks of linens for drying after the bath. One shelf holds an assortment of tiny phials and glass containers and a slab of lye soap. Curious, he scoops up the lot, randomly chooses a gown, and takes everything over to a small hassock placed next to the tub. He spies the basket with the fresh bandages sitting on the floor beside it.

Jared’s just standing in the middle of the room, closely examining the hole in the side of Jensen’s jacket. It’s funny how small he seems when not in dragon form, when in fact he’s a good three or four inches taller than Jensen himself.

Jensen pulls his shirt off over his head and looks down at his bandages. The knot holding them tight has somehow slid around to the back. He glances at Jared, at his capable, human hands. 

“Um. Would you mind helping me with this?” 

Jared’s head jerks up. “Certainly,” he says, setting down the coat.

Jared comes up behind, and Jensen holds his arms outstretched so Jared can peel off the dressings. Jensen’s suddenly, intensely aware of his naked torso, of how low his breeches ride on his hips with no suspenders or belt. His heartbeat quickens. Out of the corner of his eye, Jensen catches their reflection in the mirror. Jared’s cheeks are flushed pink, and he’s standing slightly too close, his eyes locked on the bare skin of Jensen’s lower back, at the curve of his ass.

Jensen feels a frisson of anticipation shiver down his spine and, unconsciously, he arches, just a bit. He lowers his chin to expose the nape of his neck. 

In the mirror, he sees Jared close his eyes and bite his lip. Jensen does not mistake the look.

Then he feels Jared’s fingers, plucking out the bandage’s knot, letting the two edges fall away, careful not to touch Jensen’s skin.

“There.” Jared hastens away and scoops Jensen’s coat back up, holding it strategically in front of him. He starts backing toward the door in earnest.

“Thank you,” Jensen mutters, trying to keep the breathlessness out of his voice. And then Jared’s gone and he’s alone. 

What the fucking hell just happened?

He removes the rest of his clothes automatically, his brain awhirl and his blood running hot. Stepping into the tub and easing into the water doesn’t help much, the sensual lap of liquid warmth making his cock thicken and ache. He lets his head fall back against the lip of the tub and presses the heel of his hand to his groin, just to give himself some relief.

He recognizes that it’s been awhile since he’s had a release of _that_ kind of tension. It’s not like jerking off is a high priority while recovering from a gunshot. 

But that’s not the issue. The true issue is that Jared desires him. And, god help him, Jensen desires Jared as well. 

Now that he’s acknowledged it, Jensen’s mind circles the idea cautiously, like probing a sore tooth with his tongue. He wants to have sex with Jared. It’s certainly unnatural. But is it wrong? Is it abhorrent? He thinks of Jared’s gentle hands, his tender concern, his selfless courage. None of that feels wrong. 

Then into his head pops the image of Jared in his human form, in his bed, the two of them fucking. Jensen feels his face heat. His cock twitches under his hand, stiffening even further. Clearly, his body doesn’t care if the thought of screwing Jared is perverted. 

Jensen lies still for a long moment, turning that over in his mind. He’s surprised to find he doesn’t care, either. Not really. What a difference a few days makes. In their short acquaintance, the dragon has proven himself to Jensen be as admirable and true as any man Jensen has known. If they would lie together, he has no reason to feel shame. 

And yet, it’s not fair to tell Jared that he—that he—well, there’s no other way to put it—that Jensen lusts for him, and then turn around and ride away, back down the mountain. Jensen doesn’t want to simply fuck and leave as if it’s easy, as if there is nothing between them. 

He huffs out a pained laugh. What possibly _could_ be between them? A human and a dragon, it’s deranged. But even as the thought makes him laugh, another image of Jared flitters behind his closed eyelids. Jared in his library, spinning around like a child’s toy, looking at Jensen with delighted eyes, inviting him to share his joy.

Jensen wants to ask. He wants to offer. Maybe this is something he can give back to Jared, in return for all he’s given already. A moment of shared pleasure between them. Even if it’s the last moment.

Because Jensen shouldn’t even be here. He should be long gone already. For every stolen minute here, time is ticking away in Grandcoup. And there’s a strong possibility that when Jensen leaves, he’s going into to battle, going to join his Queen and his fellow guardsmen in death. 

Jensen sits up, determined. His eye catches on the toiletries he’d brought over from the closet. He grabs up the cake of soap and quickly scrubs himself clean. Most of the other jars’ contents are dried up or soured somehow, but he finds one is half-full of a rose-scented oil. He pours a little out and rubs it between his fingers, thick and slippery. 

Yes, that will work. 

As long as he hasn’t read Jared disastrously wrong. 

 

***

 

Jensen finds Jared in the guest room—his room—changing out the sheets and coverlet on the massive bed for clean ones. How convenient. Jared’s back in his dragon shape, however, which is quite inconvenient, given what Jensen wants from him. 

The sun is stronger now, beams streaming straight in through the windows to limn Jared with light. His bright skin nearly glows, an impossible woodland green, and the long, swooping lines of him, neck to wing to tail, make Jensen halt in the doorway, his heart clenching at Jared’s beauty.

When Jared catches sight of Jensen standing there wearing nothing but the thin dressing gown, he ducks his head in that way he has—whether in human or dragon form—that Jensen recognizes as him being flustered. 

Jensen decides to take that as an encouraging sign.

“Can I help?” he asks, walking to the bed and grabbing one edge of the sheet to tuck it under the featherbed.

“There’s no need,” Jared replies mildly. “I’m almost finished. This is the first opportunity I’ve had to swap these out since you were ill. It’s good to have it done. And I hope your bath was relaxing.” He chatters on as usual, but Jensen spots him smoothing an already perfectly unwrinkled spot three times in a row, a hint that Jared’s not completely unruffled. 

“Jared,” Jensen interrupts.

“Yes?”

“Could we talk?”

“Um,” Jared seems a little surprised at the formal request, but he comes to the end of the bed to face him. “Of course. What would you like to talk about? If it is about what happened last night, I assure you again that kind of violence was quite out of character for me. I wouldn’t want you to think—“ 

“Jared—“ Jensen interrupts. He wets his lips. This isn’t as easy as he’d thought it would be. Jensen’s been with dozens of lovers in the past. The armsmen’s barracks alone was a hothouse of casual sex. Yet with each man, the rules of engagement had been unspoken but clear: some quick mutual orgasms and a nonchalant farewell. How does one go about explicitly inviting a dragon to bed? 

“I was wondering,” Jensen continues, “would you mind changing into your human form?”

“Why?”

“There’s something I want to do that I can’t when you’re a dragon.”

“Oh, well then. Give me a minute, let me see if I can find my appropriate set of clothing.”

“Never mind that,” Jensen says, daring to move closer. 

“Jensen?” Jared’s voice is tentative, but there’s a note of hope in it that Jensen prays he’s not imagining. Otherwise this is going to be very awkward. 

When Jensen doesn’t reply, Jared shifts, shimmers and shrinks, and resolves into the shape of a man. A very attractive and very naked man. One who shuffles his feet nervously. 

“What do you want of me?”

“I want to do this.” Jensen steps in and lays his hand on Jared’s bare hip. That touch alone sets his pulse leaping like a racehorse out of the gates. Or it could also be the surprised, needy sound that catches in the back of Jared’s throat, or the way his warm skin shifts under Jensen’s hand. But Jensen doesn’t pause to savor it, just quickly curls the other hand around the back of Jared’s neck and pulls him down into a kiss. 

Jensen’s never been one to bother much with kissing. He planned for this one to be short, a provisional test with an uncertain outcome. And although Jared lets out a surprised muffled squeak into Jensen’s mouth, he doesn’t resist. Not in the least. His lips are soft at first, yielding, but then they begin to move against Jensen’s, asking for more. 

Jensen’s belly swoops when he feels Jared’s tongue, the tip of it caressing along the curve of Jensen’s lips. It dips inside, tentatively, but so sweetly. It might as well be running along the head of Jensen’s cock, the feel of it makes him so hard, so lightheaded just from this. His pulse points start to thrum, the hand on Jared’s hip instinctively grips tighter, pulling Jared closer.

This feels nothing like any kiss he's had before. In the past, a kiss has been a routine prelude, something merely to get through in order to proceed on to the main event. But this? This could be all Jensen ever needs. Jared’s innocent noises, the hesitant flutter of his hand on Jensen’s shoulder, stroking down his arm, Jared’s lips eager and responsive against his. Jensen could do this forever.

And so it goes on, long minutes learning the taste of Jared. Jensen finds himself suddenly starving for the wet inside of his mouth, intimate and new. He closes his teeth lightly over the swell of Jared's bottom lip and sucks it in.

Jared gasps and pulls away, but only for a moment before he’s leaning in, his forehead resting against Jensen’s, drawing in desperate breaths of air. Jensen can see Jared’s eyes are closed and shuts his own. He waits, barely less affected, for all his past experience. 

It’s a kiss. Just a kiss. Why is the pit of Jensen’s belly already heavy and liquid, his balls pulled up tight and aching like all it would take is a few good tugs of his cock and he’d be spilling all over his hand? Jensen figures he must be harder up for sex than he’d realized.

“That was extraordinary,” Jared murmurs, so close that his lips brush Jensen’s as they move and it takes all Jensen’s willpower not to stretch up to taste them again. 

“That was your first kiss?” 

Just saying it aloud sends an unexpected bolt of triumph through him. It comes spiked with protectiveness, and desire, and impatience, and so many other unnamed emotions, Jensen’s almost drunk with it all.

“Did I do something wrong?” Jared asks fretfully. “I’m sorry, I can do better, tell me where I made a mistake and—“

“Shhh.” Jensen puts his finger over Jared’s lips, a little more plush, a little more rosy than they were before. “You were almost perfect.” 

“Almost?” 

“Well,” Jensen shrugs and lifts one side of his mouth in a grin. “I only say ‘almost’ because I’m hoping that will encourage you to want to practice more.”

Jared grins back at him, but then his expression turns somber, doubtful. “Why?” Jared whispers. “Why would you want that? Why do this?” 

It’s a question Jensen doesn’t know how to answer. It makes no sense that they’re here like this. And if there is some strange depth of feeling inside him that Jensen doesn’t recognize—something that was never there before—he shuts it away. It doesn’t matter. He can’t let it. 

So he simply replies, “Because I wanted to. I’ve wanted to for awhile now.”

“I’ve longed to hear you say that,” Jared says earnestly. “Oh, how I’ve longed for it. But how can you want me? I’m not human.” He starts to pull away. 

Jensen lifts both his hands and slides them into Jared’s hair, like he longed to do the first time—even addled by sickness—that he saw Jared. He ignores the twinge that the movement elicits from his side, because nothing is going to stop him from reeling Jared back in. 

His hair is thick and warm and soft wrapped around Jensen’s fingers. “I don’t care. As long as you don’t mind that I _am_ human, it doesn’t matter.”

Jared searches Jensen’s face carefully, his soul in his eyes. “You know, when I’d go down the mountain, looking like this,” he continues, nodding down at his body, “and I’d walk through the villages at night, leaving some pub or inn, people—men and women—would offer themselves to me. Sometimes in exchange for payment, sometimes not. I realize now why I was never interested.”

“Why is that?” Jensen asks.

“Because they weren’t you,” Jared replies, and the simple declaration grips Jensen’s heart like a fist. 

There’s danger here. Jensen senses it, scrambles to retreat. Back toward the carnal, to the simple needs of the body.

“I think we should fuck,” he says bluntly, tugging Jared toward the bed. 

The bed where he’d lain and Jared had ministered to him. The bed where he’d dreamed, nights of wanting and not knowing what or how. Well, there’s one thing Jensen knows now, for certain. He knows that he wants to run his hands over Jared’s body, _this_ body, defining his shape, his living contours. He wants to share in the pleasure this body can provide. “Do you even know what—?“

“Yes,” Jared says. “I’ve read about intercourse. Do you have any idea how many books there are in the library that deal with the subject? Shelves full! Many of them are quite explicit.”

Jensen snorts. “I imagine they are.”

“But I’ve never—that is, I realize there’s a difference between knowledge and experience. And I—“ Jared’s voice drops and his cheeks pink up, but he doesn’t duck his head or look away. “I would like you to show me. More than anything, I’d like that.” 

Jensen’s whole body lights up again at the words, all his hunger roaring back. He’ll show Jared all right.

From the pocket of his robe, he pulls out the bottle of rose oil. “We’ll need this.” 

Then he slips the robe off his shoulders, letting it fall to the ground. Jared’s jaw practically drops, his cock stiffening visibly, gratifyingly. So Jensen stands there for a second, just to let him get an eyeful. Then he turns and climbs onto the bed, settling onto wide-spread knees, pouring out a measure of the oil into one palm. 

“It will only take me a minute to stretch myself out,” he explains, reaching around between his legs and smearing the oil across and around his hole. He shoves two fingers in, impatient, coating himself as fast as he can.

“Wait,” Jared says, walking up to the mattress edge. “Wait. Can I—can I just look at you for a minute? Touch you? Would that be allowed?”

“What?” Jensen’s ready. He’s ready _now_. But if it takes Jared a little longer, he’ll force himself to be patient. “Okay. Sure. Come here.”

Jensen goes to turn around, but Jared just crawls onto the bed behind him, getting his knees between Jensen’s and pulling him back to rest against his chest. His stiff cock nestles in the crack of Jensen’s ass, the shaft pressing snug up against his hole, so close to where Jensen needs it, but not enough, not enough.

Jared’s looking down over Jensen’s shoulder, watching himself as he sweeps hands lightly up Jensen’s thighs, slow feathering moves up and down, unabashedly gentle. His palms are so wide, each stroke of them rouses heat and prickles of sweat along Jensen’s spine. Jared’s hands skim up over Jensen’s side, carefully avoiding touching his fresh bandages, and he lets his fingertips dip into the gutter of Jensen’s collarbone, then drops them down to drift along his chest.

Jensen’s always been bothered by his nipples, the way they jut out instead of laying flat, how annoyingly sensitive they are at the most inconvenient times. Like a woman’s. It’s embarrassing. He never let anyone touch him there during sex, always guided their hands to less vulnerable spots. And yet, when Jared’s fingers brush over his chest, catching on the crown of one rigid nub, it sends a line of fire straight to Jensen’s cock. He can’t help it, he presses into Jared’s touch, his back arching in a bow, needy and helpless to stop himself. 

“Is this okay?” Jared murmurs in Jensen’s ear, sounding both anxious and enthralled. “Can I touch you like this?” He’s not stopping, still slowly tracing around and round it and rubbing over the tip. He takes the other one, rolls it between his fingers. He tugs gently. Then both at once. It’s torture, each cautious movement making Jensen jolt and writhe. It’s maddening, irresistible. 

“Yes. More.” The words tear out of him. He can’t understand what’s happening. With just a few simple touches, Jared’s made him lose his head, surrender the control he’s always prided himself on. 

Curled around him, Jared’s heat is seeping into his bones, melting him like snow in summer. When Jared shifts away slightly, Jensen tries to follow, his whole body automatically chasing Jared’s, seeking his new magnetic north. Jared smells of that same musk and sweetness that he does in dragon form, just lighter, and Jensen breathes it in deep.

It’s no surprise that Jared can’t stop talking. “I like when you move. When you—when you squirm against me. It makes me shaky, it’s so incredible. You’re incredible.” 

His breath fans over Jensen’s skin. Every word is like a gold coin dropped into a wishing well deep inside Jensen, treasure to be kept forever. Jared presses his mouth to the juncture of Jensen’s neck and shoulder. “Your skin is so soft here.” His lips graze so lightly that it raises goosebumps on Jensen’s neck and down his arms. “Here too.” Jared’s hands are everywhere, sliding over his hips and the curve of his ass and the tender insides of his thighs and knees where they splay open. “You’re so beautiful. Every part of you. I can’t get enough.”

Jensen’s bucking erratically, hypersensitive, unused to such gentle caresses, unused to such simple, unhurried indulgence. His cock doesn’t seem to mind, slapping sloppy and wet against his belly as he twists and twitches. 

“Get inside me,” he begs. He never begs. But this, this is not what he signed up for. Too much, too intense.

“Yes,” Jared moans, his own hips grinding up into Jensen’s ass. “I mean, no, not yet. I want—Can I just—?“

His hand slips down to cup Jensen’s balls. He hefts them gently, fondling, tracing the thick seam down the middle, and Jensen thinks he might come, just from that touch.

He lays his head back against Jared’s shoulder and gives himself over to it, powerless against the exquisite sensations Jared’s generating. He turns his head to lick at the sweat-salty skin of Jared’s neck and then sucks, hard, at the thick tendon that runs along the side.

It draws a desperate gasp out of Jared. “I—Jensen—please—I need—what do I do?” 

Jensen can’t answer, all he can think is _finally_ and _yes_ and _now_. He fumbles in the bedsheets for the vial of oil, pours it into his trembling hand, and reaches back between them to slather it over Jared’s cock. It feels enormous, longer than anything he’s taken before, but it only spurs him higher, hotter, his ass clenching eagerly. 

Jared keens at his touch, gripping Jensen’s hips hard, hindering Jensen from trying to rise up into the right position. Once Jared figures out where he’s going, that he’s not trying to escape, he helps, lifting Jensen easily, lining them up so the blunt head of his cock is flush against Jensen’s entrance. Jared presses up, a jerky, shallow thrust that shoves through the tight muscle and wedges him barely inside. 

“Jensen. Jensen,” Jared chants, his hips flexing up and back instinctively, working his cock in bit by bit. 

Jensen burns with the stretch, a harsh red heat that threatens to char him to a cinder. He sucks in a deep breath and feels it rattle in his lungs, then lets his head hang down between his shoulders and spreads his leg wider, willing himself to relax, to open, to unlock. He shifts, drops, impaling himself further on the width of cock surging up to meet him.

Jared curls a trembling hand around Jensen’s neck, forcing his chin back, baring his throat and worrying fiercely at the skin. Jensen lets him; he's too far gone to protest anything now. All he craves is completion. He rides Jared’s cock, pumping up and down slowly, like there's nothing more important than doing this perfectly, each stroke coming easier, smoother, deeper. Jared fills up every inch of space inside him now, and more. Jensen can barely even keep a hold of what he's feeling now, so much sensation, like flying without falling, like breathing underwater, blindingly bright and brilliant, like magic.

And the best part is that Jared feels it too. “Please,” he cries, “please, Jensen—it’s too much. It’s so tight. You’re—everything—I can’t—“ 

Jared suddenly rears up, flipping Jensen forward onto hands and knees. He pulls all the way out and then drives straight back into Jensen, his fingers gripping Jensen’s ass, spreading the cheeks wide. His cock is a huge, thick weight that slams into that sweet, hidden spot at Jensen’s core, over and over, sending shards of bliss crackling across his skin like summer lightning.

“You have to touch me,” Jensen croaks, grabbing one of Jared’s hands and hauling it around to encircle his desperate cock.

He twines his fingers around Jared’s and together they jack him in a hard, measured rhythm, the slippery combination of precome and oil easing the way, Jensen torqueing his hips up to chase the wildfire blazing over his nerves. Never, never has he felt so open and exposed. Never did he know he could need something so much. 

Jared drapes himself over Jensen’s back, sets his palm on the mattress above Jensen’s head for leverage, and _thrusts_. He fucks in as deep as he possibly can go, simultaneously swiveling his palm over the throbbing head of Jensen’s cock. 

Jensen’s mouth falls open and he falls over the edge. He comes with a scorching heat that flows from him in helpless spurts, his vision whiting out at the edges, his whole body jerking with the strength of it. 

Jared’s hand tightens on him, milking him, and Jensen can feel his internal muscles quiver and clench around Jared’s length. Jared’s not even talking now, or if he is, the words are simply coming out as helpless, incoherent little noises. He ruts down into Jensen’s yielding body, wild and unrestrained, until Jensen feels his muscles lock up. Jared cries out, the sound of it echoing in the room’s rafters. A wet warmth fills Jensen up, and Jared’s hand splays across his belly as if he could feel it inside. Their chests heave in time as they both gulp furiously for air. Jensen is exhausted, sated… and completely undone. 

Jared collapses beside him, carefully turning them so that Jensen doesn’t land on his wounded side. His legs tangle between Jensen’s and he links their fingers together. 

_Just like they’d been linked while working my cock_ , Jensen notes, half-dazed, tiny aftershocks of pleasure eddying through him.

“You can pull out now,” Jensen says at last, grimacing in advance of the sting of withdrawal, now that the fun part was over. Dear god, ‘fun’ hardly scratches the surface of whatever _that_ was. 

Jared eases his cock slowly out of Jensen’s body, but doesn’t move away, doesn’t roll out of bed and hurry to don clothes to make his escape. In fact, he moves closer. Jensen feels his lips brush the nape of his neck. 

“Jensen—“ Jared’s voice rasps like sand and he chokes, starts again. “Is it always like that?” 

“No.” He doesn’t know how to explain any further. Doesn’t have words to tell Jared how different that felt than any other sex he’d ever known. Doesn’t think it’s a good idea, anyway, since this will never happen again. “No, Jared, it’s not.” 

 

***

 

Jensen wakes up alone. The room is quiet, just the bedcurtains rustling softly from a breeze coming in through an open window. 

He curses himself for falling asleep. He thrusts the covers away and gets to his feet. The sorest aches in his body are no longer from the wound or the capture. He ignores them all. He can’t let himself think about Jared deep inside of him, Jared’s hands stroking his skin, his mouth on Jensen’s neck. Maybe someday. Maybe someday he’ll recall their time together, replay it over and over in his mind, minute by minute. 

But if he’s leaving, he can’t think of it now.

As promised, Jensen’s uniform is clean—or as clean as it can be in its blighted state—and waiting for him on the chaise. He pulls on all the clothes, his belt knife and high boots too. He takes a last look around the room, forcing himself not to linger over the bed, and then turns to go. There’s nothing else to do. 

He finds Jared out in the gardens. The dragon is diligently weeding one of the rose beds. As he catches sight of Jensen approaching, he stops and pulls himself up to full height. Jensen remembers how fierce Jared appeared when he moved the same way the first time Jensen saw him. Now he simply looks distraught.

“Stay,” Jared says to him as soon as Jensen is in earshot. The single word comes out stiffly, like it pains Jared to say it, and yet like it would pain him not to. 

“I can’t,” Jensen replies.

“What do you intend to do when you get down there? Where will you go?”

“I don’t know.” 

“So you’ve got no plan, no support,” Jared reckons. “You don’t even have your guns anymore. You’re walking straight into your enemies’ clutches. Again!” Jared’s got a handful of greenery bunched in his claws, and he’s unconsciously shredding it as he speaks.

“I know. I have to.” 

“Jensen? Are you happy here with me?” 

“Yes.” Jensen doesn’t even hesitate over the answer. Such a simple thing, but he’s surprised to discover that it’s true. Rarely in his life has he sought his own happiness, never would he have dreamed he’d find it here. And still, in the end, he must leave. “But my father. My prince. They’re in peril. They may be dying.” 

“Or dead already?” Jared offers somberly.

“No! I can’t believe that. And I can’t sit idly by for my own safety’s sake if I have even the slightest chance of coming to their aid.” 

Jared stares at Jensen, looking long into his face as if memorizing his features, mapping each one individually. At last he says, ”Then—then you must go to them.” 

There’s no denying the pain in Jared’s expression, of everything he’s struggling—and failing—to hold back. Jensen wants to reach out and touch him, to reassure him. To say he’ll be fine, that he’ll return as soon as he can. 

But he can’t risk making his last words to Jared a lie.

“Thank you,” Jensen says simply. “Thank you for understanding how much my duty means to me.”

Jared nods brusquely and turns back to his flowers.

Jensen turns away, too, and practically runs to the stables. 

 

***

 

Jensen’s got the little mule saddled, but right now he’s just standing by, looking at it with consternation. He’s trying to calculate whether he actually wouldn’t make better time on foot than with such a paltry mount. And, honestly, thinking about how sore his ass is right now, how much worse it will be in the saddle.

A shadow falls over him from the stable door. “I’m coming with you.” 

“What?” Jensen spins to find Jared ducking his head to enter.

“It will take you hours, probably into the night, to reach Grandcoup. If you’re not intercepted again in the woods, that is. Or if you don’t succumb to exhaustion. Or break your leg in the dark. Also, there might be snakes. Okay, maybe not. But I can fly you there safely in a fraction of the time. And I’ll change form and accompany you into the City. You need someone to watch your back.”

“No. That’s madness,” Jensen protests. It’s one thing to put his own life in unknown danger; it’s another thing entirely to drag Jared into it with him. 

“It’s not. I’ve made dozens of trips before into human villages and gotten away undetected each time.”

“But never to Grandcoup,” Jensen retorts. “What if we’re captured in such a populous place? Didn’t you tell me you can only hold your human form for a short time? You can’t reveal your true self. If a dragon suddenly appeared in their midst, they’d destroy you.” 

Jared snakes his tail around and wraps it gently around Jensen’s wrist. His eyes are soft and his mouth twists in a pained smile. “If you leave and don’t return, I’ll be destroyed just the same. And not by the hand of men.” 

It’s as close to “I love you” as Jensen’s ever heard. He can’t breathe, his chest squeezed by some giant, invisible fist. Part of him wishes he’d never come here. Wishes he’d never lead the threats and chaos of the human world into Jared’s safe haven. Wishes he’d never learned the depth of fear he feels right now for this precious, beautiful creature. 

If this is love, it’s a dreadful thing. 

Jared takes advantage of Jensen’s silence and moves toward the mule. He begins to unsaddle it. 

“Besides,” he says adamantly, “you forget, Alan is my friend, too. If you insist on a rescue party for your father, I’m going along.” 

“Jared, please—“ 

“The quicker you give in and help me, the quicker we can leave.”

In dragon form, Jared weighs ten times what Jensen does. He literally can—and has—pick Jensen up and take him where he wills. Jensen’s not sure he’s going to win this battle, and, as Jared reminded him, time is of the essence. 

“Fine. But you must do _exactly_ as I say. And if I think whatever we face is too risky, you have to promise to leave if I ask.” 

Jared cocks his head, considering. “I will leave if it becomes too dangerous for me to stay.” 

Jensen would argue further, but the stubborn look on Jared’s face tells him that the dragon’s pledge is going to have to be good enough. Jensen just hopes he doesn’t regret this.

 

***

 

By all that’s holy, Jensen could not regret this more. 

Once Jensen had conceded, Jared had quickly pulled out a pack filled with clothes. It was something he kept in the stables’ storeroom to take whenever he planned to change into human form. Once out in the courtyard, he’d handed the pack to Jensen to hold and scooped him up in his arms as he had the day in the Great Hall. Without warning, he’d taken three running strides, thrown his wings wide, and catapulted them both into the sky.

Now they’re in flight, and Jensen’s curled around the worthless pack in terror, gripping it so hard he’s going to puncture the thick leather with his fingernails. There’s a bottomless hollow where his stomach used to be as Jared dips and swoops, buffeted by the wind. That wind batters Jensen unceasingly, so brutal that he has to keep his eyes screwed shut against it. Which is just as well, because the one time he opened them, he saw the entire world stretched out beneath his dangling feet, the forest so far below he could barely make out the individual trees. At any moment, when Jared haphazardly drops him, he’ll plummet to his death, falling and falling until he’s pulverized in the impact with the ground. 

He doesn’t know if the flight the night before was this harrowing, and he just doesn’t remember, or if this is worse because they are going so high, so fast, so—oh god.

Jensen would probably be screaming if there was even the tiniest space for air in his clenched-tight throat. At least he hasn’t vomited. Yet.

He has no idea how long they fly. An eternity, it seems. His muscles have seized up from holding himself rigid, and the roar of the wind has deafened him, but finally— _finally_ —Jared slows, and turns appallingly on the tip of one wing to aim toward landing. 

The moment they hit the ground, Jensen flings himself out of Jared’s arms and onto the soft grass. He finds they’ve settled on the bank of a small creek, and never has he been so grateful to be still, stationary. He presses his cheek to the earth, willing his head and his gut to stop spinning in opposite directions.

“Jensen?” Jared asks tentatively, coming up behind him and nudging his back with his snout. “Are you alright?” 

“No,” Jensen grunts.

“Oh. I—um—I thought you might have enjoyed the flight, as quick and smooth as it went.”

“Enjoy?” he says, voice rising. “Enjoy?!” There’s an edge of hysteria in it now, and Jensen takes a few deep breaths to gather his wits. “Jared,” he continues at last, calm, very calm, “that was the most horrific experience of my life. I would take on Pellegrino and his men a dozen times before I ever go through that again.” 

“Oh,” Jared says again. “I’m sorry. I guess I never thought that you—that anyone—wouldn’t love to fly. It’s so beautiful and free up there. Everything so exhilarating. The wind currents alone are like this fascinating obstacle course to navigate.” He glances up at the sky with a look of wonder, but then quickly turns anxious eyes back at Jensen. “But I would never intentionally do anything to make you ill or unhappy. I just assumed you would—“ 

“Hey. It’s okay.” Jensen heaves himself up off the ground, onto his knees, and then stands, as slow and creaky as an ancient grandfather rising from his chair by the fire. “We made it, and that’s all that matters.” He looks around the glade. “Where are we?”

“I couldn’t fly in a straight line over the valley in the daylight, because I didn’t want us to be seen from any of the smaller hamlets that are on the direct path from the castle. No need to draw attention or scare anyone. Or encourage anyone to come hunting dragons, that’s always on my mind. Anyway, I skirted us around to the west. I got us as close as I could, and now we’re just a short walk from the Traders’ Highway, less than a mile from the city gates.”

Jared takes his clothes from the pack and shakes the wrinkles out, laying each piece carefully on the grass. Jensen watches as he transforms, a shivering, shimmering switch from dragon to man. He drinks in the sight of Jared’s bare body. Vivid scraps of memory of their earlier encounter flash through his mind, and Jensen realizes he did not get the chance to really _see_ Jared, to sample and savor all his parts, the way Jared had partaken of him. The thought sends a flush of heat through him, and he hastily wrenches his mind back to the task at hand.

Fortunately for him, Jared is practiced at dressing quickly and has already donned trousers, shirt, waistcoat, and a simple cravat. The clothes are neither too rich nor too poor; he looks just like a merchant or a journeyman from some guild. An excellent disguise for getting into Grandcoup unremarked.

Jensen glances down at his own court uniform, which is just the opposite: both too opulent and too worn. Also, he knows he’s still gaunt from his illness and recovery, and probably green at the gills from that hideous flight. _So much for Handsome Jen_ , he snorts to himself. 

He raises his eyes in the direction Jared had indicated the City lay. “Let’s hope we run into a loyal regiment of the Heir’s soon, so I can get some fresh clothes.”

“I think you look very nice,” Jared says earnestly. But he holds up a cloak that was also in the pack and drapes it over Jensen’s shoulders, hiding his finery.

Jensen tosses him a sardonic smile and starts out toward the road. 

As they walk side by side, Jensen thinks to ask, “How long can you stay in this form? As a man? Will you be okay? I recall you telling me it wasn’t for long.” 

Jared looks up at the angle of the sun. “At least a day,” he says. “Until tomorrow evening, I’d guess. I’m never exactly sure. But will that be enough?”

“I hope so,” Jensen replies. “A lot can happen in a day. Who knows what’s occurred in the days since I’ve been gone.”

Caution wars with Jensen’s eagerness for news. He doesn’t want to be discovered by enemies, but he needs to get some sense of where to go for allies. So when they come upon a convoy of wagons on the road, he and Jared pretend to be travelers from another kingdom miles away. Jensen finds it amusing that Jared can mimic a Lumierian accent and encourages him to chat with the wagon drivers to see if they can provide any information about the status of the royal family. 

There’s uncertainty, but not outright fear among the company, which makes Jensen think that, whatever has happened in the last few days, it hasn’t come to full civil war yet. However, they also find their companions keen to share a host of contradictory rumors. One man insists that Queen Amanda is in hiding, another tells Jared and Jensen that Prince Colin is either dead or going to marry his aunt, Alaina. A third claims that Brock and Alaina killed each other in a duel just the day before. 

They travel all the way to the city gates with the convoy, with not much solid intelligence to show for it. Fortunately, when they arrive, Jensen recognizes a cadre of the Queen’s troops manning the entry. 

In his relief at seeing them in control, Jensen is tempted to salute and identify himself. But he reins the impulse in, not wanting to reveal himself as the Heir’s partisan based only on their traditional uniforms. If Alaina’s in control, she’d likely keep as much the same as she can, make everything seem normal. So military uniforms wouldn’t necessarily be a giveaway. Jensen tucks Jared’s cloak tighter around himself to hide his coat’s colors and approaches the nearest corporal. “Excuse me, sir,” he says, as meekly as he can. “Can you tell me whether General Morgan is in the city? And, please, where we can find him?”

The sentry barely looks at him. “Check at the Lord Mayor’s House,” he says matter-of-factly, “since that’s where Prince Brock is headquartered.”

Jensen turns and raises his eyebrows at Jared silently, and they pass through the gates, heading down the main thoroughfare toward the City Center. The usual commerce—workmen unloading sacks of flour and women with baskets over their arms on the way to the grocer, pedestrians pushing carts, bakers and fishmongers—is bustling on with no regard to the warfare within the Royal House. Jensen feels a twinge of outrage. Queen Amanda was murdered! But he decides to try to take it as a good sign. No matter what chaos at the top, here on the ground everything is just the same, like always.

They shoulder their way through the foot traffic, and Jensen says to Jared, “That seemed awfully easy. Perhaps you should wait here, or even outside of town, while I figure out exactly what we’re walking into.”

Jared shakes his head. “How can I help if I’m not with you when the danger appears? What if the Heir isn’t really here? What if it’s a trap? You’re not even sure where your adversaries are!”

“I don’t really believe there’s danger here,” Jensen assures him. “Just let me find out what’s happening, and I will come right back to you.” 

“I’ll wait outside if you wish,” Jared counters, “but within eyesight.” 

The Lord Mayor’s House sits at the end of a cobblestone avenue nearly abutting the Palace, conveniently placed for communication between the LeGeai Crown and the administrators of Grandcoup. Built in the old timber-framed style, it stands several stories higher than the surrounding buildings. Its dark beams and whitewashed gables stand out bright against the gray stone of the Palace’s defensive walls. 

Jensen nods his head toward a pub across the plaza that has benches lining the wall facing the House. “How about there?”

Jared eyes the site skeptically. “Fine. But I’m coming in after you if you don’t return before long.”

“How long is too long?” 

Jared looks down into Jensen’s face, but then turns aside with a slight flush. “Any time without you is too long,” he murmurs, as if he’s hoping Jensen won’t hear.

“Jared—“ he starts, but doesn’t know how to respond, torn between discomfort and fondness at the dragon’s artless sentiment. He feels an inexplicable temptation to pull Jared into a kiss, but this is the worst time or place for that. So he simply shakes his head, saying, “I’ll come back or send word in an hour.”

He walks toward the manor’s great oak doors to go in search of either his commander or his king.

After the ease with which they entered the city, Jensen’s relieved to see that there’s at least some protection in place. He’s stopped by several layers of security, from the steely-eyed guards at the outer doors of the manor, to the duty officers just inside the hall who search him for weapons and make him wait, to another functionary of some sort who grills him with the same questions again, none of whom he recognizes. But just as he’s starting to worry the Heir isn’t really here after all, Brock himself appears. 

He bursts out of a side chamber and wraps himself around Jensen in a tight embrace, as he hasn’t done since he was just a lad. Jensen holds tight in surprise and relief. The weight of worry he’d been carrying since he’d left Brock fleeing through the streets lifts off him.

“Jensen, Jensen, my Captain,” Brock says eagerly, “we thought you were dead. Where have you been?”

Jensen’s tongue-tied for a minute, having forgotten to make up a story about his absence that does not include Jared. A handful of the Queen’s foremost advisors trail Brock out into the hall, several of them greeting Jensen with pleasure. He notices several faces conspicuously missing, lost to them in the Council Chamber slaughter.

“I—um—found a place to shelter north of the city,” Jensen tells them, “trying to recover from the shot I took. I was fevered and bedridden, but I’ve come back to you as swiftly as I could. I’ve had no news of what’s gone on in my absence? Where is Lady Alaina? Is Colin alright?” 

He wants to ask about his father, too, but at the anguished look on Brock’s face, he holds back on that for a moment.

“Come inside,” Brock urges, tugging at Jensen’s arm. “Join our counsels.”

The invitation is way above Jensen’s station—he’s a low-level officer, merely one of the princes’ bodyguards—however, he can sense the Heir is in need of a familiar face right now.

Brock leads him back into what’s apparently a command post of sorts, and on the way, one of the company—Queen Amanda’s First Chancellor, Ruth Connell—fills Jensen in. “Alaina’s coup has failed. Only a few units remain under her command, some in the surrounding villages, most here in the City. The rest have surrendered to General Morgan’s forces. We’ve trapped Alaina herself, with her most loyal troops, inside the Palace proper. But they’ve successfully sealed it against us, and they’ve numbers enough to hold it, unless we launch an attack en masse.” 

Brock drops wearily into one of sturdy wooden chairs surrounding a conference table. “She has Colin hostage inside.” Just a week ago, Brock had still been very much a careless and dashing young prince. Now, with the death of his mother and the burden of rule upon his shoulders, he seems to Jensen suddenly much more a man. “A few rescue attempts have been launched, but none succeeded. Your father was one. Three nights ago he volunteered to go into the Palace, attempt to parlay with Alaina or to smuggle Colin out somehow. There’s been no word from him since.”

“What is your plan now?” Jensen asks. “Can you starve them out, or—?“ 

“We are out of time. Yesterday, Alaina sent a messenger out under white flag. She—“ Jensen can see Brock’s jaw clench convulsively, then he continued, “—she demanded I surrender, myself and the Crown, in exchange for Colin’s life.”

Lord Sheppard speaks up, his ordinarily droll tone now somber and serious. “When we said no, she sent out a box. Inside was one of Colin’s fingers, bearing the silver ring he wears—wore at all times.”

“It’s mine. A gift from me,” Brock says, burying his face in his hands. “Alaina knew that.” 

“She sent word,” Sheppard continues, “that she would return Colin a piece at a time unless the Prince submits to her, and she is permitted to take the throne.”

“This morning they delivered his ear, Jensen,” Brock chokes. “Next she’s threatened to take his eye. Then his—his manhood. You know me, you know I’d give my life for my little brother, but I have seen what my _aunt_ —” he spits the word like a lethal curse, “—is capable of. How can I give it all over to her, when her rule will likely lead to more butchery and death?”

Jensen swallows back the bile that’s risen in his throat. In his mind is Prince Colin as he first knew him: a mischievous little boy, lighting forbidden firecrackers with his brother late at night. He says, “Colin would let himself be cut apart for you.” Brock sucks in a breath, as if Jensen had struck him instead of offering comfort. “And he would never agree to turning the kingdom over to his mother’s executioner.” 

The Duchess of Rhodes, a notorious hawk among the royal advisors, rises to her feet and slams her palm against the polished tabletop. “We have to strike now, Sire. You must defeat the traitor and bring peace back to LeGeai.” 

“It will mean many lives lost,” counters young Lord Chau. “The Palace is not impregnable, but it will not be taken easily. If we wait, the troops inside may lose heart and abandon her without bloodshed.” 

“We’ve been over and over this for hours,” Brock announces over the murmurs around the table. He stands slowly. “And I say at last, we must attack tomorrow.” For some reason, he glances at Jensen for affirmation. Jensen finds himself nodding reluctantly. “Colin will forgive us, but I will not stand by while he is tortured any further,” the Prince continues. He looks around the table, catching each courtiers’ eye one by one. “Are we agreed?” 

The group assents, and Brock’s gaze turns back to Jensen. “I’m glad to have you here in such a dark hour, Captain, but sorry you’ll be put to service again so soon. Will you go with us against my aunt in the morning? We will storm the Palace at dawn, so that Colin may at least have a death that is swift and clean.” 

Jensen’s head swims. A darkness laps at the edges of his vision. Colin is being mutilated, Brock is heading into battle. Jensen realizes that he’d gotten his hopes up, deluded himself into thinking, once he’d managed to get back to the Prince’s side, that everything would be fine, that he could make things right and safe again. He feels his knees buckle and he gropes of the nearest chair. 

Brock grabs his arm to keep him from falling. “Jensen! Are you still ailing? Of course you are! Here. Sit.” 

“No,” Jensen insists, shaking his head, pulling himself straight. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not. You’re in no shape to fight.”

“I am fit, I swear.” He curses himself for showing a moment of weakness. He must be there to guard Brock in the coming fight. He looks around the table for support, wishing Morgan were here. He’d know the Prince needs Jensen at his back. “Do not forbid me to join you, Sire.”

Sheppard chimes in, “There are many preparations that have to take place before we assemble for an assault.” 

“Go upstairs and eat, get some sleep,” the Prince tells him. “I will send for you before dawn, if you are well.”

Jensen wants to argue, but Brock has already turned away to join the counselors in a discussion of men and logistics. One of the Mayor’s servants steps forward and quietly offers to escort Jensen to a guest room on one of the upper floors. 

He has no choice but to follow. 

The servingman says nothing as they’re trudging up a third flight of stairs, which is just as well, because Jensen is indeed at the end of his strength. He struggles to conceal his gasps for breath and when he looks up, there are tiny flashes before his eyes around the edges of his escort. _Better to passing out here than in front of the nobility,_ he thinks.

They reach a hall of small, spartan bedchambers. The servant stops, looking down the row of rooms uncertainly. Jensen bulls past him and stumbles into the nearest, letting himself fall onto the cot inside.

To his surprise, the man follows Jensen in and shuts the door behind. Like Jensen, he leans wearily against the doorframe. 

“Whew,” he says. He’s sparkling even brighter now.

Between one blink and the next, the servant’s appearance melts away. Then it’s Jared standing there, a rueful smile on his face. 

“What the hell!” Jensen exclaims. 

“It’s been more than two hours,” Jared says, shrugging. “You didn’t come back, so I came inside in search of you. They weren’t going to tell me where you were dressed like this—“ he gestures down at himself in his merchant’s clothes, “—so I put on a little disguise and wandered around for a few minutes. I was lucky to find you in that conference room. You know, the Heir is a very interesting man, very impressive. Younger than I’d pictured. ” 

“I can’t believe it,” Jensen says. Dancing dishes were one thing, this was something absolutely impossible. “That was some of your magic?” 

“Yes,” Jared replies. “I don’t do it very often, because it’s hard to maintain for any stretch of time. But as long as I only have to change my appearance slightly, I can get away with it. The illusion builds on the foundation of what’s already there, you see.”

“No,” Jensen says, slumping back against the wall behind the bed. “Not really. But I’ll take your word for it.” He closes his eyes for a moment, his mind an ant’s nest of problems with no solutions: Colin. Brock. The deaths of his fellow guardsman that await come morning. And now Jared. What’s Jensen going to _do_ with him?

There’s a firm rap on the door and, before Jensen can react, it starts to swing open. His eyes dart to Jared, who has just a split-second’s chance to jump out of the way and hide behind it. 

It’s two actual servants, one laden with a tray full of food, the other with a fresh uniform. 

“I beg your pardon for disturbing you, Captain,” one says diffidently. “We were told you needed dinner and a change of clothes. We thought it better to provide it now, before you settled in for the evening.”

Jensen doesn’t have time to say anything before they are whisking around the room, pulling a side table over in front of him and laying out the meal. Jensen clambers to his feet, positioning himself between them and the door, blocking any view of Jared. 

“Thank you, thank you very much.” He’s got his hand on the doorknob now and is waving at them with the other. “You can go now.” It’s not very polite, but they’ve probably received worse. The Mayor himself is known as a real ass.

Finally, they leave. Jensen shuts the door and locks it. He finds Jared hunched down against the wall, unsuccessfully trying to make himself look small. 

They exchange a wordless look of relief. 

Jared stands, pulls the room’s sole chair up next to the small table and its spread. “You should eat.” He takes Jensen’s spot sitting on the cot, pulling his feet up so that he’s cross-legged like a child on the mattress.

But Jensen doesn’t sit, just grabs a hunk of bread from one of the platters and bites into it fiercely. He starts pacing, back and forth, adrenaline coursing after the near discovery.

“How much did you hear,” he asks Jared, “in the counsel room?” 

“Quite a bit. Enough to know they’ve proposed a battle in the morning.”

“Alaina will kill Colin, and my father and any others, before she lets Brock free them.” Jensen’s brain races faster than his feet, but he finds no escape from the disastrous situation facing them.

“Perhaps we could steal into the castle tonight and retrieve the young prince,” Jared offers. “He is your enemy’s only bargaining chip, yes? It sounded to me as if, once he’s safe, there’d be no need for further bloodshed.” 

Jensen shakes his head. “My father already tried that, to no avail.”

“Well, he did not have a sorcerer with him,” Jared grins, and it’s wicked, even without his dragon teeth. He waves a hand and suddenly appears to be the servingman again. He gestures at Jensen, who feels his whole body prickle and sting for a moment. When he looks down, he’s the match to Jared in common livery, his hands look thicker and calloused, his body squat and barrel-chested.

“Incredible,” Jensen whispers, poking at his belly. He doesn’t feel any different. It’s all in the seeming. The illusion falls away in another shower of twinkling light. 

He glances up to see Jared’s eager expression. “I can’t maintain it forever,” the dragon says, “but I think I can get us into the Palace, and hopefully back out again. It depends on whether we have to carry the young prince or not. That will be harder to camouflage.”

Jensen feels a slender shoot of hope, but tamps it down. “I can’t ask you to go in there. It’s too dangerous. And we have no idea where they’re keeping Colin or the other prisoners.” He pours himself a cup of wine from the skin on the table, then goes back to pacing.

“I’m willing try,” Jared replies, shifting to set his feet on the ground, leaning forward insistently. “What’s the worst that could happen? If we’re trapped inside when Prince Brock leads his charge, we can protect the young prince and the other captives, maybe we can provide aid or sabotage.” 

“The worst that happens is that they kill us if they discover us.”

“But you may be killed in the attack tomorrow as well,” Jared points out. “It seems worth the risk if it means preserving all those other lives as well.”

The calculation makes sense, in a coldly rational way. But Jensen’s finding it harder and harder to be rational about the idea of Jared putting himself in danger. “Why do you care?”

“I don’t. Not really,” Jared says bluntly. He cocks his head to the side. “I only care about the best way to protect you.” 

Jensen sets down his cup and walks over to the cot to kneel at Jared’s feet. “I don’t deserve it,” he says softly, looking up into Jared’s eyes. 

Jared doesn’t answer him directly. He just reaches a hand out to cup Jensen’s jaw. His long fingers sink into the short hair at the nape of Jensen’s neck, his thumb brushes across Jensen’s cheekbone in a soft caress. At last he says simply, “Let’s go see if we can save your countrymen and your father.”

Jensen closes his eyes. He holds himself still under Jared’s hand, but just barely. Because part of him wants to argue, to scream, wants to keep Jared from sacrificing himself, because—in all honesty—they’re unlikely to come out of this alive. He wants to lock Jared in this room, to strip him naked and cover his mouth with his own, to bear him down onto his back on that cot and fuck until neither of them can breathe, to make Jared moan and make him beg. He wants to find a way to prove to Jared that he’s all Jensen’s… and that Jensen is all his.

And now that the idea has taken hold of him, there’s no resisting it. He surges up and covers Jared’s mouth with his. Jared lets out a surprised _mmmph_ , but his lips part swiftly beneath Jensen’s as if they’ve kissed a thousand times. Jensen drags his teeth across Jared’s cheek to the base of his jaw. He nips sharply down Jared’s long, beautiful neck and presses his hot, open mouth to the hollow of his throat. 

“Jensen, oh, what are you doing? Oh,” Jared gasps as Jensen starts to fumble at his belt and the buttons of his trousers. 

“I want to blow you,” Jensen growls, daring him to say no. 

“What’s that?” Jared asks, even more breathless as Jensen moves between his legs, working his pants open and wrapping his fingers around Jared’s cock. 

“I’m going to take your cock into my mouth and suck on it until you come,” Jensen replies, his mouth actually starting to water at the thought of it, Jared thick and hard and hot on his tongue. 

“I wonder why it’s called ‘blowing’ then, if—“ 

Jensen cuts off Jared’s ridiculous musing by tugging his cock out into the open air. It's already fattening up in Jensen’s palm, the shaft flushed a rosy red. He rubs his thumb over the slight sheen of precome glistening on the silky head. And Jared smells so damn good, so warm and spicy and delicious, that Jensen moans in spite of himself. He moves forward, tonguing the slit, and then curls down to take the whole of Jared’s cock into his mouth.

Jared moans along with him, thrusting his hips up, and Jensen lets him slide in deep. Then he pulls back to lick along the length, feeling Jared’s cock growing and stiffening with every second. 

“Don’t stop, please, don’t stop, Jensen. I don’t know what I’ll do if you stop,” Jared whines, as if Jensen had any intention of doing so.

Instead he opens wide and swallows Jared down, wrapping a hand around the base when he can’t take it all, opening his throat as far as he can to see if Jared will let loose and fuck his mouth. He’s too stuffed full to give instructions, but he moans encouragingly again when Jared cups his cheek with one hand and pumps his cock a little deeper, and then deeper still. 

He can feel tears gathering in the corners of his eyes and it's hard to breathe as Jared plants his feet on the floor and his hips come up off the cot. But Jensen doesn’t care. Loves it, in fact. Accepts everything Jared’s giving him, lost in the taste of him and the pressure pounding at the back of his throat. He sucks, salivating helplessly, messily, his spit dripping down onto his fist and the blankets between Jared’s legs. His own cock presses painfully against the front of his own trousers, but he ignores it as he fights to take more, faster, to push Jared over the edge.

Jared’s chanting, _yes, yes, yes_ , and Jensen chases after each one, needing to feel Jared come apart beneath him, needing to taste his come, drink it down and keep sucking until Jared’s drained dry and satisfied. He feels a telltale jerk against his tongue, feels Jared’s hands tighten in his hair, and so he screws his mouth down all the way, until his nose brushes the coiled hairs covering Jared’s groin.

Jared brings his hand to his mouth, biting it to stifle a shout as he spends himself down Jensen’s throat in a creamy, bitter flood. Jensen swallows, chokes, and pulls off with a gasp, and suddenly he’s coming in his own breeches like a stripling, hunched over and quivering with the taste of Jared’s release coating the inside of his mouth.

It’s a good thing the servants had brought a change of clothes. 

Jared slumps back against the wall, panting, his softening cock framed between his legs and a hazy, bewildered look on his face. "What brought that on? Not that I’m complaining, because I’m not. I never would. In fact, if I had ever imagined such a sensation was possible, it’s likely I would have asked you do that as soon as I walked in the door."

Jensen shakes his head, wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. "I don’t know. Just... you inspired me, I guess," he says, savoring the brief moment of euphoria an orgasm provides. 

He stands up and adjusts himself in his soiled pants. He smiles mischievously at a Jared. “If we make it through tonight, I may ask for the same in return.” 

“All the more incentive to succeed,” the dragon replies with a mirroring grin.

 

***

 

Jared convinces Jensen to rest for a few hours, arguing that they’ll have a better chance to sneak into the Palace under cover of night. He doesn’t need to argue much; Jensen feels as tired as he was the first morning he woke up in Jared’s care. And given the embarrassing near-faint in the counsel room, Jensen concedes that it’s risky for him to attempt anything without a break. 

He lies down on the narrow cot. Jared settles into the chair with his feet propped on the table. 

Jensen finds himself thinking of the night before. Of curling up under Jared’s wing on the mountainside. For a moment, he longs for his bed back at Jared’s castle, big enough to hold both of them. It’s strange. He’s never sought out that kind of physical intimacy with anyone in the past.

Jensen closes his eyes, certain he’s too wound up to actually sleep. But the next moment Jared is shaking him awake in a darkened room. “The clock outside tolled an hour past midnight,” he whispers. “And the activity outside seems to be settling down. Although it’s hard to tell exactly, because this room faces the back alley and not the courtyard. Which would probably be appreciated by most guests who stayed here, but—“

“Alright,” Jensen says, blinking away the cobwebs. “Let’s go.”

Jared throws his glamour over both of them, and they slip out of the room and down the stairs, Jensen in the lead. Once safely outside the manor, they hurry down moon-flooded streets, dodging into doorways to avoid the squads of Brock’s soldiers that march toward the Palace’s front gates where the assault will be focused.

Jensen guides Jared, however, in the other direction, searching for the same hidden entry from which he’d spirited Brock in their initial flight from Alaina. There’s a good chance she’s discovered it since then, but it’s the most viable entrance point Jensen knows. He can only hope she’s not anticipating his return.

Against the Palace wall, there’s a grate set in the cobbled stone, what looks like just an ordinary drain for rainwater. Except that when Jensen hooks his fingers into one edge and pulls it up, beneath is a wide hole with a rope ladder dangling down into the pitch dark. 

“I’ll climb down and wait for you at the bottom,” Jensen murmurs. “The passage beneath the walls is only a few dozen yards long.” 

Jared nods, and Jensen descends into the black void of the passage. When he reaches the floor, he holds onto the ladder to steady it, feeling it bend and twist as Jared follows. He puts a hand on Jared’s calf in warning, then his leg, his lower back, guiding him down. Then, he takes Jared by the hand, and extends his other to touch the wall beside him. He blindly feels his way down the tunnel, tugging Jared along behind. 

It’s a much easier trip without a bullet hole in one side. 

“If I were in dragon form,” Jared says in a plaintive whisper, “I could light a fire for us to see the way.”

“If you were in dragon form, you’d get stuck wedged in here and be no help at all. Now quiet, I’m not sure how far voices carry down here.”

Jensen counts steps in his head— _hundredneleven, hundredntwelve_ —until he feels the rude stone of the tunnel wall turn into smooth brick. He squeezes Jared’s hand in warning. There should be stairs right in front of them. 

Up they go, still in complete darkness, Jensen with his arm extended out in front of him so he doesn’t accidently crash into the door at the top. When they reach it, he sends up a wordless prayer before reaching out to turn the latch. 

Incredibly, it clicks and the door falls open. Jensen scrabbles to catch it before it can swing wide. He peers through the small gap. There’s enough moonlight filtering in through the wall of stained-glass windows beyond to show that the Royal Council Chamber is empty. The tables and chairs lay scattered in disarray, left exactly as they’d been the day of the Queen’s murder. Jensen pushes aside memories of scarlet splashes of blood and the acrid, burnt smell of gunpowder and steps out into the room, motioning Jared to follow.

“Up or down?” he whispers. Back in the room at the Lord Mayor’s, he and Jared had debated whether Alaina would be holding Colin prisoner in his lavish suites in the Summit Tower or whether she’d relegated him or the others to the dank criminals’ cells in the basement. 

Jared shrugs and shakes his head. 

Jensen knows they are in danger of running out of time. Colin’s got to be their primary goal, he’s the key to any power Alaina still has. Jensen figures better to go up first, and if they don’t find him there, they can work their way down through the castle, be ready to aid Brock when he arrives.

He feels the warm tingle of Jared’s magic wash over him, and looking down, Jensen sees he’s dressed now in a common guardsman’s uniform. 

“No sparkles,” Jensen mutters. 

“I’ll try,” Jared says stiffly. 

They slip out of the Council Chamber, and walk purposefully, side by side, as if they’re on some kind of patrol of the halls. Really, they ought to be carrying muskets of some sort, but Jensen’s not sure whether Jared’s illusions could extend to something like that. Jensen starts to rehearse an explanation for if they run into any real guards. However, their luck holds, and without being detected, they make it to the circular stairs leading up to the royal family’s rooms. 

Jensen’s really tired of stairs.

Up and up they climb. There are oil lamps set in small niches, every third one burning low and throwing up flickering shadows on the walls. The twist of the staircase is tight, dizzying. Jensen’s made this trip any number of times with Brock, but tonight it seems to go on forever. 

Eventually they do reach the top, and Jensen stops on the last step, peeking out from the archway to check whether the coast is clear. The main antechamber is empty, all the doors to the various suites are closed. 

Colin’s is the first one on the left, and there’s nothing to do but go in to see. Jensen decides to take it at a rush; sneaking won’t help if there are armed guards on the other side. 

Confident Jared will follow his lead, Jensen sprints from the stairwell, prepared to bust through the door with his shoulder. But it’s unlocked, and he’s able to fling it open and rush inside. He spots a man huddled across the room on the floor by the massive curved window bay, shackled hand and foot to a heavy iron curtain rod bolted to the wall. 

But the man isn’t Prince Colin. It’s Jensen’s father. 

Jensen glances around to make sure they’re alone, that it’s not some sort of trap. He runs through a shower of sparks as Jared’s illusion upon him dissipates, dashing over to kneel at his father’s side. Alan appears to be unconscious, but when Jensen lays a hand on his shoulder, he rouses. His face is haggard and ashen. Jensen’s never seen him like this; even in his old age he’s always seemed invincible. 

“Sir,” Jensen says softly. He notes with dismay his father’s abraded wrists, his shallow, labored breaths. “You’re as cold as ice. We have to get you out of here.”

His father catches sight of Jared over Jensen’s shoulder, his eyes widening with alarm. 

“Jensen,” he barks, voice harsh with disuse, but urgent. “I want you to leave this place.”

“We’re here to liberate you. You and Prince Colin.”

"You must go... now! Forget the prince. Forget kingdom,” his father says, struggling to sit upright, coughing and wheezing. “You must get Jared out of here. Don't you understand? Jared is one of the last dragons on earth. Possibly the very last. You must protect him at all costs."

Jensen twists around to look at Jared, who’s still near the suite’s doors. "Is this true?"

But before Jared can answer, Jensen sees something’s truly wrong. Jared’s slumped down on the floor with his back to the wall, his face is as pale as a ghost. Even from across the room, Jensen can see he’s trembling. 

“What's wrong?” Jensen calls, torn between going to him and staying at his father’s side.

Jared doesn’t answer; his father does. “He can't stay in his human form so long.”

“He told me he could make it until tomorrow night!” Jensen protests. He turns from his father then, and hurries back to Jared’s side. “Are you alright? Tell me you’re alright.” 

Jared looks up at him with a wan smile. "Performing sorcery while in this form… it's harder than I anticipated. Much harder.”

Jensen looks back and forth between the two. Both incapacitated. What does he do now? How can he get them out of the Palace if they can’t even stand? How can he leave without Colin?

His father is laboring to get to his knees, the manacles around his wrists clanking too loudly in the midnight stillness. If the window was open, they’d hear it all across the courtyard.

_If the window was open._

Jensen grabs Jared’s arm and hauls it over his shoulders, helping him stand and shepherding him over to the bay’s bench seat. Once there, Jensen uses his free hand to unfasten the window’s hasp and throws them wide open. 

“Can you change back?” he asks Jared urgently. “Can you fly?”

“What?” Jared asks faintly.

“You can go out the window and change back into dragon form. Take my father and fly back to the castle. I will find Colin and, once I have him safe, I will meet you back there. Tomorrow, or as soon as I can.”

“No,” Jared says, squaring his shoulders. “You’ll be killed. I can’t leave you here. ”

“You must. Unless you leave, with my father, we will _all_ be discovered and killed. Now, can you fly?” He starts unbuttoning Jared’s waistcoat, stripping it off and then pulling at the hem of his shirt. 

Jared hesitates for a second, his lips pressed in a thin line, but then he starts to help, stripping quickly out of the rest of his clothes. Without thinking, Jensen stands between Jared and his father, shielding his naked form, to provide some privacy. He takes Jared by the hand and helps him climb up onto the bench. Then Jared sets his other foot on the window frame, ducks his head, and steps out into mid-air, swinging himself around to the side. 

Between one blink and the next, the man is gone, and the dragon sits, clinging to the vine-covered stone of the tower, his tail wrapped around the curve of the wall. Moonlight glints off of his sleek skin, but it blends enough with the foliage that, if they didn’t know to look for him, no one from the ground would spot him there. 

He snakes his head around to look Jensen in the eye. “Come with us. Please.” 

Jensen’s not sure whether Jared, in his weakened state, will be able to carry his father, much less both of them. “I will meet you back at home,” Jensen responds adamantly.

Jared doesn’t protest further. He reaches a clawed hand in through the window and rips Jensen’s father’s chains from out of the wall effortlessly. He scoops Alan up and hurtles away without another word. They almost immediately disappear from sight into the dark sky, and Jensen waits by the window until he can no longer hear the flap of Jared’s wings.

 

***

 

He’s alone now. No companions. No magical disguises to shield him. No idea where Colin might be. 

But nothing can be gained by even a minute’s more delay. Jensen turns away from the windows and scans the room for something he could take up as a weapon. He doubts the prince keeps a firearm in here, but he does spy a decorative pair of ancient swords displayed on the wall, blades crossed and gleaming. 

It’s better than nothing, so he rips one down, checks its heft and edge. He leaves the other behind, wanting one hand free for whatever might come next, and slips out of the door and back out into the anteroom. 

Jensen methodically checks the other living quarters—Brock’s and the empty suite traditionally reserved for consorts. When he gets to Queen Amanda’s suite, he hesitates out of habit, knowing that all but her own personal armsmen and servants are forbidden to enter. But then he pulls the door open grimly, recalling that she’ll never require such privacy again. 

A swift glance around reveals that these rooms don’t appear to be deserted like the others. There are discarded piles of clothes on the floor and used dishes strewn across an ornate dining table.

From the archway leading to the bedroom area comes a glimmer of light, and Jensen sneaks closer to observe a small candle burning in a holder by the bed. A slim shape lies under the comforters, and Jensen prays it’s either Colin or Alaina. Either one would bring him one step closer to success.

He practically runs across the room, sword upraised, but when he reaches the bed, he tosses it down onto the richly carpeted floor. Because it’s the young prince sleeping there, his head wrapped in bandages, blood seeping through them at the place where his right ear once had been. He’s curled up on the edge of the mattress, his gangly teenage limbs tucked tight in a ball.

“Colin—“ Jensen whispers, reaching out to touch the boy’s shoulder lightly.

“If it’s time to take more of me, make it swift. Or kill me now, I beg you.” Colin says it in an awful, calm tone, not recognizing Jensen in the dimness.

“It’s Captain Ackles, Your Highness. Jensen. I’m here to rescue you.”

“Jensen?” he gasps, and he struggles to shove the blankets away. Jensen comes to his aid and together they get him up and standing. Like Jensen’s father, he’s weak, his eyes even more hollow and tormented. Jensen deliberately keeps his gaze away from the boy’s hand. 

“Come,” Jensen urges. “We have to escape quickly.”

But even as the words leave his mouth, the doors to the suite burst open, and in sweeps Alaina, flanked by ten of her soldiers. It’s the middle of the night, and her castle is under siege, and yet she’s groomed to the same height of elegance she’s always maintained, hair piled up in an elaborate chignon, lips red as blood. She’s had an outfit tailored that matches the royal armsmen’s livery, but with more sumptuous materials and feminine flourishes. It should look silly, but she makes it resplendent.

Jensen shoves Colin behind him, backing them both toward the far wall. The sword lays on the floor by the bed, but it doesn’t matter. All of Alaina’s men carry guns. 

“So kind of you to join us, Handsome Jen,” Alaina purrs, as if meeting him in a formal drawing room for tea. “I thought we’d seen the last of you, but you’re much like a cat with nine lives.”

Jensen doesn’t reply, doesn’t bother with a riposte, clever or not. His mind’s too busy scrambling, searching for some way out of this. 

“I still have need of my sweet nephew,” she continues, and from the corner of his eye Jensen sees Colin shudder violently. “But you? I think I’ll send your body out on a slab for Brock to cry over. Maybe you and your father both? We’re coming down to the end, now, and I needn’t scruple over sacrificing pieces.” 

Jensen takes brief solace in the thought of Jared carrying his father far, far away as they speak, then focuses back on the danger before him. 

“You can’t possibly think you can take the throne from Brock, my lady,” Jensen temporizes. The honorific rolls off his tongue automatically, but he feels nothing but contempt for her and her treason.

“I do. And I will,” she replies. “I just have one question for you. Answer me truly, and perhaps I’ll spare your father after all.” Jensen herds Colin back a few more steps. This is clearly some kind of trap. “Pellegrino blundered in from patrol this morning, alone,” Alaina goes on conversationally, “raving like a lunatic. We all heard him, didn't we?” She looks around at her soldiers for confirmation, and they all nod their heads. “He said he’d captured you, Captain Ackles, in the woods but that you’d been rescued by a dragon. A dragon! As he tells it, one with a long, ugly snout and sharp, cruel fangs. You don't get much crazier than that.” She scoffs, and the soldiers behind her echo her with derisive laughs. 

Then she fixes Jensen with a piercing stare, all humor gone. “Is there a dragon in our land, Captain? Where is it?”

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Jensen grits out. If he’d ever thought his father consumed by his dragon obsession, it was nothing to the madness he sees in Alaina’s eyes.

“Either tell me where it is, or my men will carve the information out of you, just like they’ve sliced up that miserable stripling behind you.” 

She signals to her minions, and the soldiers advance as one across the room toward them. 

“Jensen?” he hears the prince whisper shakily, as they back all the way against the curve of windows that match the one’s in Colin’s rooms.

Jensen thinks about the vines Jared had clung to, the ones growing thick up the side of the tower. Could Jensen try to hold their captors off while Colin climbed down them? Was it even possible from so many stories high? It was a hopeless plan, a suicidal one, but he had nothing else.

Time almost seems to slow down then. Every moment stretches out, dreamlike, as he spins and grabs Colin around the waist, leaping onto the bench seat and kicking out at one of the window latches, sending the entire panel flying open. Behind him he hears Alaina scream something to her men, in front of him the wind whistles past, the darkness beyond the windows like a solid black wall. 

“Climb out!” he yells at Colin. 

“No!” the prince cries, clinging to Jensen’s shoulder.

But just as the pack of soldiers reaches for them, Jensen hears Jared’s voice boom out from somewhere below. “Jump! Jensen, jump to me!”

He doesn’t think, doesn’t hesitate. He instantly launches himself and Colin together out into the abyss, his fear of falling forgotten in the split-second of choice.

He feels Colin’s hands go lax, falling away, and Jensen clutches him in an iron grip as they tumble downward. But their fall is arrested, solid arms wrapping around them both. Jared swoops away from the tower, pumping his wings to send them shooting straight upward, Jensen’s face buried in his chest.

Gravity drags at them with each surge of Jared’s wings. Jensen can feel himself shaking, delayed panic setting in, turning all of his bones to water. If Jared didn’t have them held so tightly, they would surely fall, because Jensen has no more strength to hold on, and Colin is a limp weight across his lap. The prince is unconscious, must’ve fainted from the shock. Jensen wishes he had, likewise, but instead he’s all too aware of their flight. He feels them stall at the top of their climb, and then Jared sends them into a tight spiral, coming down, down from their height above the City. 

With a sudden jerk, Jared halts their quick descent, and they float lightly down the last few feet to landing. 

Jensen drags in a shuddering breath, willing his heaving stomach to subside. He opens his eyes and sees that they’re in the narrow alley behind the Lord Mayor’s House. It’s deserted, none of the troops they’d seen moving about the streets earlier that night are in evidence. Jensen listens to see if he can hear the sound of battle, but the city is asleep, everything is still. 

“This is as close as I can get without being seen,” Jared pants. He sets Jensen down, and props Colin, still out cold, carefully up against the wall, his long legs stretched out in front of him.

“My god, Jared—“ Jensen begins, but is interrupted by the sight of his father, hobbling out from a doorway in the manor’s rear, as if he’d been waiting for their arrival. 

“You did it!” Alan calls out softly. 

“Yes,” Jared replies quickly. “Go in now and rouse the house, please. The prince needs medical care. And so do you!” 

The dragon turns to Jensen, looking him over from head to toe, and then tugs him into a swift embrace.

Jensen wraps his arms around Jared’s neck as tightly as he can in return. “Thank you for saving my life… _again_ ,” he whispers into Jared’s skin. 

“And it’s marvelous that you were able to save the prince and your father. You never gave up. I hope they know how lucky they are to have you. That they value you as you deserve.” Abruptly, Jared pulls back, steps away. “I have to leave, before I’m seen. It will be light soon.” 

“Take me with you,” Jensen blurts out.

“I would. I long to. To be back there, just you and me. But if you stay here, you can help me, make up a story of the young prince’s rescue that doesn’t include my presence. I fear it may be too late, but if there’s some way to cover my tracks, perhaps they won’t come to hunt me down. And you’ve proved that—“ Jared’s voice hiccups, but he continues, ”—that your place is here. As a hero.” 

He reaches out and touches Jensen’s cheek with one long claw. “Goodbye, Jensen… my love.”

Then, before Jensen can reply, he turns and bolts down the alley, gathering speed and spreading his wings to lift himself into the air.

Jensen drops to his knees next to the prince’s unconscious body, eyes raised to the sky. Barely a minute later, dozens of servants and soldiers come swarming out of the rear of the manor carrying a cavalcade of candles and lanterns, lighting up the dark alley like midday. Their exclamations ring out, breaking the quiet, as they rush to Jensen and Colin’s side, surrounding them. They begin to minister to the prince, try to lift Jensen to his feet, but he brushes them off.

His father comes up behind them all, pushes his way through the crowd to where Jensen kneels. He claps Jensen on the shoulder. “You’ve done well, son. I’m so proud of you.”

They are words that, in the past, Jensen would’ve given anything in the wide world to hear. But right now he barely notices, they simply wash over him. The only thing he cares about is gone. Flying north.

 

***

 

Messengers are quickly sent to the army gathering at the Palace gates, and—just a few minutes after the staff gets Prince Colin awake and into a bed with his wounds carefully being re-dressed—Brock comes sprinting into the room.

He throws himself at Colin, remembering at the last second to be gentle as he catches him up in his arms, laughing aloud in relief and joy. Jensen watches as Brock runs his hands all over his brother’s body, ascertaining that he’s, if not whole, at least well. Colin cups his good hand around the back of Brock’s neck and pulls him down so he can put his lips up against his brother’s ear, whispering, and the Heir responds by laying kisses on his cheek. 

It’s such a nakedly emotional reunion, Jensen dismisses most of the staff who’re milling around the room and herds the rest down to the far end, in order to give the brothers a small degree of privacy. And if any should question whether the brothers seem too close, well, Jensen stands ready to rebuke them. The boys have lost both parents, now, and all they have is each other.

Besides, Jensen happens to be in love with a dragon. He has no room to judge anyone else’s choices.

Eventually the princes’ reunion is complete, and Brock calls the physicians over to continue their attentions to Colin. Jensen sees Colin slump back into the pillows, pain etched across his face. 

_If only I had some of Jared’s tea to share,_ Jensen thinks. He presses his palm to his side, but the pain from his gunshot wound is gone. All that remains is weariness from the night’s adventures.

Brock walks over to Jensen and takes him by the hand, bringing it up to Brock’s chest to rest over his heart. “How can I ever repay you, Captain?”

“There is no need, Sire,” Jensen replies, pulling his hand away and clapping Brock on the shoulder familiarly. “I’m honored I could be of service.”

“Sometime I’d like to hear the whole story, but we still have Alaina to deal with.”

Jensen hopes he can hold off telling that story until he has a chance to speak with his father and with Colin to come up with a common version. One that doesn’t include Jared. “What will she do when she discovers Colin is gone?” 

“I’m not sure,” Brock says. “But at least there’s no need for us to wage an outright assault now. And I’ve already put out word of an offer to spare the life and position of any of her men who submits and swears loyalty to me. I think my aunt will find only a few bad apples will stay with her now.” 

A group of commanders enters the room, and Brock turns away to confer with them. A maid approaches Jensen and offers to see him to a separate room to rest, but Jensen can’t bring himself to leave the hub of action quite yet, not until he hears whether Alaina will surrender. So he asks for food and washing water to be brought, and sits in a chair at the foot of Colin’s bed as the sky beyond the window turns grey with dawn.

It’s possible Jensen nods off for a minute or two, he’s not sure. But when General Morgan marches in, he automatically bolts to attention. Morgan nods sharply at Jensen but doesn’t hesitate in making a beeline for the Heir. He murmurs some news to Brock in his low, gravelly voice. 

Jensen hears Brock exclaim in surprise, “She’s gone? To seek a _dragon_? Surely you’re joking?”

Jensen rushes across the room in time to hear Morgan say, “I only know what the surrendered armsmen told us. They opened the Palace gates to us just minutes ago. They tell us she’s fled with her closest confederates under cover of the night, overpowering the company we left guarding the entry by the Lower Kitchens. I spoke to the informants myself. According to them, Lady Alaina’s convinced she knows where a dragon’s castle is, and she’s planning to kill the beast and take its gold so she can flee the kingdom and live in comfort.

Jensen’s heart starts to pound before Morgan’s halfway through his report. Jensen isn’t sure if Alaina really knows where Jared’s castle is. But he knows there’s no gold. And he also knows that Alaina and her men might slay Jared in the attempt to find some. 

“Good riddance to her,” Brock is saying to Morgan. “If by some miracle there _is_ a dragon, either it kills her or she manages to kill it and she leaves forever. Either way we’re better off.” 

“Your Highness,” Jensen interrupts, taking a knee at Brock’s feet. “A boon,” he says. “I ask a boon from you.” 

His mind is racing, struggling to come up with a way to protect Jared, to enlist help. Unfortunately, the Heir—soon, as a matter of course, the King—will be among the first to call for the destruction of any monster that dared venture so close to the city and its citizens. It’s too dangerous to reveal that a dragon’s actually out there. But he must find a way to—to—

“There is no dragon!” Jensen blurts it out, just the germ of a plan, but it’s all he can think to try. “I believe I know what Alaina’s aim is. But it’s only a man who lives on the mountain, not a dragon. The tale of a beast, of treasure… it’s nothing but a rumor. Please, Sire,” he bows his head lower, trying to walk the fine line between a simple entreaty and outright, indecent begging. “He took care of me when I was wounded. He got me back to the City in time to help. I want to go back and aid him now. Would you send troops with me to save him from Alaina’s depredations?”

For a moment Jensen wonders whether Jared would fly away to escape attack. But no. The library. Jared would never abandon it. He would defend it with his life. And although in dragon form he’s formidable, Alaina’s men have guns. They’re more prepared than Pellegrino’s camp was. And likely they have stronger numbers, enough to overwhelm Jared and bring him down. 

Jensen squeezes his eyes shut against the mental image of Jared’s corpse, bloody and torn, the head cut off as a trophy. 

He jumps to his feet, unable to wait longer, desperate to rush off to Jared’s aid, alone if necessary.

“Hold,” Brock says. Jensen holds himself rigid, not breathing, as Brock looks at him thoughtfully. Then the Heir glances over at the bed where Colin is deep asleep. “We have many companies mobilized and at the ready, with no one for them to fight. And, upon further consideration, I believe it would be more prudent to make sure my aunt is not roaming free, possibly to return someday and bring the kingdom more grief.” He turns to Morgan. “Will you stay here and clean up the rest of this mess? Guard my brother from further harm? I’m going with the Captain to hunt down the traitor.”

“There’s no need,” Morgan protests, “for you to go personally.”

Brock locks eyes with Jensen again. “Yet, with the Ackles clan involved, I would not be surprised if there is indeed, miraculously, a dragon. And when else will I have the chance to fight one, protect the people of LeGeai from one?” His expression hardens. “Or, if there is no dragon, to avenge myself on the villain who murdered my mother and disfigured my brother?” 

“Let’s convene your Counsel, Sire,” Morgan suggests, “and craft a more deliberate plan. We’ve barely finished dealing with the current emergency.”

 _We must go now,_ Jensen thinks desperately. _Every minute we wait, every minute she gets farther ahead could mean Jared's death._

But he holds his tongue, not daring to tempt fate with presumption. If the Prince chooses delay, Jensen will go on alone.

“No, General,” Brock says. “I’m tired of waiting. Give the command to saddle our horses.” He turns to Jensen. “Now, Captain, tell me where we’re going.”

 

***

Getting a royal army regiment moving is no light manner—especially when the soon-to-be-crowned King is at the head of the company—and Jensen is nearly beside himself by the time they are fully armed and equipped and riding out of the city toward the mountains. Alaina has a huge head start on them. Jensen's only hope is that he knows exactly where the castle is and can lead the army directly there. If he's lucky, they can get to Jared before Alaina does.

During the long ride, Jensen catches Brock watching him, and he tries to stop himself from fidgeting and keep his head down, not sure what he’s giving away, but not wanting to be called to further account. 

Morgan stayed behind to safeguard the city, but Omundson is with them, and so is Beaver, and Jensen feels confident that, whatever they face, Brock will be well-protected by these veteran officers. The farther off the mountain they stray, the more anxious Jensen gets, seeing signs of a troop’s recent passage—undoubtedly Alaina’s and her men—but no sign of catching up to them.

At last, after hours of travel, of restraining himself, they approach the castle, and Jensen simply cannot wait a moment longer. As they reach the final rise, Jensen suddenly spurs at his horse. He takes off past Brock and his commanders, shouting, "I will see you at the top!" and his horse races up the slope.

Once he hits the flat, he sends his mount galloping across the footbridge over the moat and flies through the gates onto the grounds.

It’s chaos there. Enemy soldiers rush toward him in twos and threes across the lawn, but they don’t attack or even stop, just run past him, panicked, away from the castle. Jensen throws himself out of the saddle, intercepting one man, who babbles about enchanted objects—hat racks and mops and furniture—coming to life. That they’re somehow defending the castle. 

Jensen finds himself grinning at Jared’s tactics. Child’s magic, indeed. But then it turns into a frown when he realizes he must find a way to keep these rumors from coming to Brock’s ears. They mustn’t raise doubts in him about Jensen’s claim that Jared isn’t truly a sorcerous monster. 

But he can’t worry about that now. Above all else, he has to get to Jared. Right now.

Jensen draws both pistols and sprints toward the castle. The doors stand open, their ornate knobs splintered into pieces, as if they’d been battered open.

There’s no one in the Great Hall. Frantic, Jensen hesitates, hears Jared’s roar echo down the corridor, and takes off in that direction. Just a few steps down the hall he surprises two of the invaders. They hastily try to bring their muskets to bear, but Jensen mercilessly shoots one through the heart, the other in the face. No one is going to stop him from reaching Jared. 

He rushes on, tossing the empty guns onto the ground and immediately drawing his sword from its sheath. 

He skids into the ballroom and sees Alaina’s troops ranging up the West Wing stairway. At a glance, Jensen counts possibly a score, but no more. The room reeks of gunpowder, but there are no shots being fired, so Jensen figures the attackers must be out of ammunition. They’ll be no match for the troops Brock is bringing up in reinforcement, but they are sufficient to overwhelm Jared, who’s cornered, slowing inching upward along the rail. Jared can’t even use his fire for fear of burning down the entire castle.

Alaina is at the front of the mass of men, her own sword pointed at the dragon’s throat. 

“Where is it?” Jensen hears her scream hysterically at Jared. “Tell me where the treasure is and we will kill you cleanly. I swear, if I cannot find it, it will take you days to die.”

If her men had any more rounds for their guns, it’s clear Jared would be done for. He’s nearly beaten already. Jensen can see that one of his wings is lying at a strange angle against his back, unusable, and he’s limping, a hop-skip favoring a leg, as he retreats down the corridor. Rivulets of blood stream bright red down the copper and gold of his belly. 

Jensen can’t understand what Jared’s doing. Why is he leading them up these stairs? There’s no safety there. As Jensen well knows, the floor above is moments away from collapse. 

But then it hits him that Jared cannot lure the enemies into a trap without himself as bait. And his wing is broken, useless. 

“No!” He whispers it to himself in horror as he watches it all unfold in seconds. Jared, letting Alaina close, past his defenses. Her remaining men, following hard on her heels. Jared—timing so that just as they reach him, finally swarming over them, their swords raised high to strike—steps back onto the weakened structure. 

And where Jensen had merely fallen through the floor, the weight of all those bodies—Jared’s and his human foes—topples the entire structure of the wing. The whole platform and staircase shears away, the floor opens up, large chunks of wall and ceiling and an entire section of the roof come tumbling down as Jared and the soldiers fall into the gaping maw left by the disintegration of the floor beneath them.

Pieces are still raining down as Jensen surges forward, throwing his sword heedlessly aside. The ballroom is unrecognizable, destroyed in the collapse, the building’s guts spewed into a pile in the middle of what was once a room. The castle wall to the exterior is gone and a soft rain has started, pattering down onto the rubble. 

Jensen runs headlong toward the giant pile of debris and digs through the wreckage with his bare hands.

He can’t hear any cries of pain or screams for help. They must all have been crushed. But that does not stop him from continuing to dig, shoving away huge pieces of wood and plaster and stone and shingle. He sees a flash of green and redoubles his efforts, finally able to free part of Jared’s body from the top of the pile of rubble. 

Jensen works harder, digs faster, calling Jared’s name, scanning for any signs of movement, of life. He finds that he’s weeping, his tears falling onto Jared’s skin and leaving splotches in the dust that covers him. 

Jensen can’t remember the last time he cried.

At last he has Jared unearthed. He lays his cheek against the dragon’s chest. Faintly, almost imperceptible, he hears a heartbeat. It could be wishful thinking, imagination. Jensen waits, holding his breath. So long, so long. And then, _drub drub_. Another. Unmistakable. 

The unbearable weight on his chest dissolves and a sob of relief scrapes from his throat. He’s still crying as he clears the rest of the rubble carefully away from Jared’s limbs, particularly cautious of his delicate wings, wanting to smooth them gently into place, but fearful of touching them and doing more harm than good. 

Jared stirs. His eyes slit open. The first thing he sees is Jensen. 

“You came back.” 

It hardly sounds like him, his voice cracked and feeble. But it doesn’t matter, because he’s _alive_. Jensen reaches out to caress Jared’s cheek, the lightest of touches.

“Of course I came back. I couldn't let them... this is all my fault. If only I'd gotten here sooner.”

“At least I got to see you one last time,” Jared says. 

“What are you talking about? You'll be all right. Everything's going to be fine.”

“They know what I am, Jensen.” And maybe Jensen’s imagining it but it seems like Jared’s voice is already stronger. “I have to leave. The humans will kill me for certain if I stay.” 

Jensen hears shouts from the courtyard and realizes that Prince Brock and his troops have caught up with him and are rounding up the last of Alaina’s fleeing men. 

Jared hears them, too. He shifts trying to get up, but he’s still too weak. He lets his head fall back, his eyes close. 

“It’s too late. They won’t let me live, even if they are your friends. You must go. Leave me here.” 

Jensen takes Jared’s hand and holds it to his face, the wicked talons feel fragile against his cheek. “No. I won’t. I won’t let them hurt you.”

“Why?”

“Because—because I love you, too.” Jensen smiles down at the dragon. His dragon. “Besides, I have a plan.”

 

***

 

Minutes later, Jensen walks out of the castle’s ruined front doors, Jared with him, his arm slung over Jensen’s shoulder to support his limping steps. 

Jared is in human form, Jensen having run from one side of the castle to the other to find Jared’s clothes, the richest set he could gather up at a moment’s notice. He’d swiftly helped him dress, although Jared hadn’t had nearly enough time to heal in dragon form, still battered and fractured. Jensen had whispered a constant stream of apologies and encouragement as he’d eased him into the linen shirt and ornamented trousers, gold vest and a rich blue coat embroidered with gold and high calfskin boots. Enough to convince the crowd of witnesses outside that Jared was a man, and a noble one at that.

Together they approach Prince Brock, who has dismounted and is surrounded by his soldiers and their prisoners. The brief rain has stopped, and bright rays of sunlight break through the clouds like arrows aiming straight at the heart of the dragon’s garden. The rose bushes are blooming, with a riot of tiny red flowers adorning the grounds. 

“I hope you know what you’re doing,” Jared murmurs, low enough that only Jensen can hear.

“I hope so, too,” Jensen replies, giving Jared an encouraging squeeze where his hand supports his waist.

“Ow.”

“Your Majesty,” Jensen calls out once they’re close enough. “May I present to you Jared, Crown Prince of the land of Padalecki. Years ago he was enchanted by a terrible dragon, who used sorcery to transform the Prince into a hideous beast like himself. Jared hid away in this abandoned hulk,” Jensen gestures at the castle behind them, “where Lady Alaina sought him out. She and her men were crushed by the castle’s collapse, buried under the stone and wreckage.” A wave of surprised murmurs rolls over the crowd at that news.

Jensen continues, “But Alaina was sorely mistaken in thinking she could find a dragon’s treasure, for no such beast actually lived here. Today the spell has been broken and Prince Jared is once again a man.”

Jensen pauses to let his outrageous proclamation sink in, waiting to see what the response will be. He knows most of his countrymen know very little about dragons, and even less about magic. It should work. It should.

Brock looks skeptically at the pair of them, and then glances up to study the ruined castle, the whole west side collapsed in on itself. Jensen’s heart starts to sink as he senses the Heir suspects that there’s more to this story than meets the eye.

“Congratulations, on your release from your curse, my lord,” Brock says finally. And if there is a small curve to the edge of his mouth that hints that he is not completely taken in, only Jensen detects it. “How was the spell broken, Captain Ackles?”

Jensen glances at Jared, his hair pulled back in a hasty queue, revealing his face scored with cuts and bruises. Still so beautiful. 

He looks back at the King. “True love, Your Majesty,” he says simply.

“Ah,” Brock replies. “I see.” His smile widens, this time wholly approving.

“May I have your permission,” Jensen asks, “to take leave of your service, Sire, and escort Jared back to his homeland?”

“With my blessing. Thank you for all you’ve done,” Brock says, adding with a deeper note of gratitude, “and for my brother’s life.” He nods and then turns to his company, raising his voice imperially. “Now that this is settled, who among you are hardy enough to take the trip back down to Grandcoup with me right now? I am impatient to start on the business of restoring peace after Alaina’s treachery. We now have time to honor my mother in state, with all respect and grief.”

With that, he kicks his horse into a trot and sets off out of the courtyard and on his way, his astonished men scrambling to follow behind. 

Jensen is slightly astonished too, that his plan had actually worked. He turns a smiling face to Jared, only to find him slowly sinking to the ground with a groan. 

Jensen helps him down, kneeling and then sitting to rest beside him in the soft grass. He guides Jared’s head down to his lap and pulls the leather tie from around his queue, combing through his hair to let it fall free in a fan over his thighs.

Jared sighs. “Tell me when they are far enough away that I can turn back safely.” 

“I shall. But give it another few minutes, if you can.” He hates to ask it of Jared, knowing he must be in pain and that in dragon form he will heal much faster. But it would be tragic if, after pulling that feat off, they were discovered by a random armsman coming back to fetch some commonplace item he’d left behind.

“Where is the kingdom of Padalecki anyway?” Jared asks without opening his eyes, turning his face into Jensen’s petting like a big cat.

“Wherever you want it to be.” 

“Can we take my books with us?” Of course that would be Jared’s main concern. Jensen smiles down at him. There’s a powerful ache in Jensen’s chest, like it’s too weak to contain the torrent of emotions surging within. 

“Yes,” Jensen assures him. “We’ll find a way to take the books.”

“Are you scared?”

“A little. I’m not really prepared for this.”

“Me neither. But we made it this far, right? None of your tales would’ve predicted that.” 

“No. I guess they’ll have to write something brand new about us.”

 

 

~THE END

  
[ ](http://s37.photobucket.com/user/deirdre_c/media/82827_original_zpssdfrvgod.jpg.html)

**Author's Note:**

> I cannot possibly give enough thanks to my betas, the amazing and supportive dancing_adrift, who constantly brought me the world's greatest joy by giggling at all my little Beauty and the Beast references, and to my precious cherie_morte, who did Herculean work and provided the most perfect comments at the 11 and 1/2 hour. Truly, thank you both so, so, SO MUCH. The fic would never have gotten finished without you. And huge appreciation to wendy for running the spn-j2 Big Bang Challenge year after year.
> 
> Please go check out the lovely accompanying art made by sophiap: http://sophiap.livejournal.com/292475.html


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